Showing posts with label infrastructure. Show all posts
Showing posts with label infrastructure. Show all posts
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Indonesia - Investment Policy Review – OECD

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

The 2010 OECD Investment Policy Review contains a quite comprehensive assessment of Indonesia’s regulatory and investment policy. For those of you who areinvestment lawyers, Chapter 2 discusses in depth, Indonesia’s  implementation of international investment principles. Other aspects such as competition policy, infrastructure, and corporate governance were also addressed. A sneak peak of the book is available in Google Books . The book dedicate a sub chapter on water infrastructure (ch 5.6) and cited my newspaper Article (Indonesia Needs a Strong Water Services Law). The analysis on water related investment is not really in depth, but it agrees that vague laws and regulations could be a deterring factor for foreign investment in this sector. The book’s executive summary is available for a free download, but the complete hard and soft copy versions are not free.



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A Case Study of Semarang Water Utility (Paper)

Wednesday, September 15, 2010


UNDIP e-Journal published a paper about Semarang water utility.  Here’s some interesting facts on the paper:

  • In order to obtain the water connection people have to pay installment cost Rp 700.000 (75 US $) and it is equal with minimum wage per month for labor in Semarang.
  • According to the State Auditing Agency, PDAM Semarang had a loss of Rp. 21 billion from customer arrears and mismanagement.
  • Around 10.000 water connections are suspended for 2 months (Suara Merdeka, 03/20/2007) and will not be activated unless customer paid their debt.

Read more.

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Jakarta’s water leakage is at 50%

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Now, on to water services. VOA interviewed Jakarta Water Regulator who told that the rate of non-revenue water in Jakarta’s Water Supply System is around 50%. NGOs such as the Mercy Corps has been quite successful in engaging with local community in Penjaringan district in order to help them build water storage infrastructure. 

 







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The New Negative List for Foreign Direct Investment 2010 (Confirmed)

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

 

On my previous post, I blogged about the new rule on negative list of investment (Daftar Negatif Investasi or “DNI”). The BKPM recently issued a press release about this. Here’s a snippet:

 

8)  Several sectors give opportunities for foreign capital to more help strengthening the financing capacity for domestics:
a.  Industrial sectors in siklamat and saccharine were previously closed for investment and now they are opened with certain license.
b.  Public works industries in construction have an upgrade of foreign capital ownership from 55% to 67%.
c.  Culture and tourism sectors in filming service (studio of filming, laboratory of film processing, dubbing facilities, printing and film reduplication) is now opened for foreign capital of 49%.
d.  Health sector in hospital services, clinics of specialist doctors clinic laboratories and medical check-up clinic has also an upgrade in foreign capital ownership from 65% to 67% and the location of the activities can now be done all over Indonesia.
e.  Electricity sectors in electricity generators (1-10MW) can be carried out in partnerships, whereas the generators higher than 10 MW, the ownership of foreign capital is maximum 95%.

9)  There will be several adjustments on foreign capital ownership for several sectors and it may be due to the existing of some new decrees or to give wider opportunities for local investors:
a.  Agricultural sectors in the cultivation of principal food crops (corns, soybeans, peanuts, green beans, rice, cassava, sweet potato) with the width of no more than 25 hectares, the ownership of foreign capital is maximum 49% based on the Decree No. 41 Year 2009 regarding the Protection of Sustainable Agricultural Land.
b.  Sectors of Communication and Information in the fields of:

i.  Mailing administration, is conditioned to have special permission and the foreign capital is maximum 49% based on the Decree No. 38 Year 2009 regarding mailing.
ii.  Providing, managing, (operating and renting) and providing construction service for telecommunication towers are 100% local investor ownership.

10) In order to implement Indonesian commitment in investment related to ASEAN Economic Community, this current DNI adds one new attachment (Attachment II.j) which rules out the conditions of foreign capital ownership and/or location for investors from ASEAN countries. These investors are given dispensation in owning capital more than the other foreign investors, for example in the transportation sectors in maritime cargo handling services of which the ASEAN investors are allowed to own foreign capital with the maximum of 60% while the other foreign investors are only allowed for 49%.


You can download the Presidential Regulation 36 Year 2010 on Negative List of Investment here (in Bahasa Indonesia). Alternatively, you can have a look at Google’s translation of the DNI regulation in this page (Google’s translate has been improving quite a lot although it can get lousy for technical terms sometimes). You may find some tips on filling out BKPM Forms on my previous posts below.

 

If you have any specific question, you can email me at movanet(at)gmail.com

 

Related Posts:

 

The new investment negative list (2010)
The New Negative List of Investment (2007) 
How to set up a company in Indonesia
Geothermal projects in Indonesia
Water investment in Indonesia
Some note on Indonesian Investment Law
Living with the Other Fishes
Guide to doing business in Indonesia



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The new investment negative list (2010)

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

 

As of today, still no news in BKPM’s website about the new Presidential Regulation 36/2010 on investment’s negative list. But below is the new list according to some news source. Note: as I don’t have the Perpres 36 with me yet, please treat this as an unconfirmed.

 

  1. Industrial sector: In the industry of cyclamate and saccharin previously closed to investments, now opened with special permission.
  2. Public works: In the field of construction services foreign capital ownership increased from 55 percent to 67 percent.
    Culture and tourism: in the business of filming techniques 49 percent is opened to foreign capital.
  3. The health sector: in specialist medical clinics and medical support services, foreign equity ownership is increased from 65 percent to 67 percent and its activities can be conducted at locations throughout Indonesia.
  4. Electricity sector in the business of power plant (10-10 MW) can be done in the form of partnerships, while for above 10 MW, the maximum foreign equity ownership of 95 percent.

 

Meanwhile, in some other business sectors foreign capital ownership is adjusted:

 

  1. The agricultural sector: in the cultivation of staple food crops (corn, soybeans, peanuts, green beans, rice, cassava, sweet potato) with an area of more than 25 hectares, the maximum foreign equity ownership of 49 percent (in compliance with Law No. 41 Year 2009 on the Protection of Agricultural Land Sustainable Food).
  2. Communication and Information Sector: in the business of the postal administration, special permit is required and the maximum foreign capital is 49 percent (in accordance with Law Number 38 Year 2009 on Postal Service).  Meanwhile the provision, management (including operation and rental) and provider of construction services for telecommunication towers (BTS towers ) must have 100 percent domestic capital.

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The Economist and the human right to water

Saturday, May 22, 2010


H.T to Bo.
The economist recently released an excellent report on water. But there are some parts of the report that disturbs me a little:

Industrial use takes about 60% of water in rich countries and 10% in the rest. The difference in domestic use is much smaller, 11% and 8% respectively. Some of the variation is explained by capacious baths, power showers and flush lavatories in the rich world. All humans, however, need a basic minimum of two litres of water in food or drink each day, and for this there is no substitute. No one survived in the ruins of Port-au-Prince for more than a few days after January’s earthquake unless they had access to some water-based food or drink. That is why many people in poor and arid countries—usually women or children—set off early each morning to trudge to the nearest well and return five or six hours later burdened with precious supplies. That is why many people believe water to be a human right, a necessity more basic than bread or a roof over the head.

From this much follows. One consequence is a widespread belief that no one should have to pay for water. The Byzantine emperor Justinian declared in the sixth century that “by natural law” air, running water, the sea and seashore were “common to all”. Many Indians agree, seeing groundwater in particular as a “democratic resource”. In Africa it is said that “even the jackal deserves to drink”.
A second consequence is that water often has a sacred or mystical quality that is invested in deities like Gong Gong and Osiris and rivers like the Jordan and the Ganges. Throughout history, man’s dependence on water has made him live near it or organise access to it. Water is in his body—it makes up about 60%—and in his soul. It has provided not just life and food but a means of transport, a way of keeping clean, a mechanism for removing sewage, a home for fish and other animals, a medium with which to cook, in which to swim, on which to skate and sail, a thing of beauty to provide inspiration, to gaze upon and to enjoy. No wonder a commodity with so many qualities, uses and associations has proved so difficult to organise.


If you read these sentences carefully, you will find:

  • The reason why there is the right to water
  • The first consequence of the right to water
  • The second consequence of the right to water

What are they? Let’s return to the paragraphs:

 

Industrial use takes about 60% of water in rich countries and 10% in the rest. The difference in domestic use is much smaller, 11% and 8% respectively. Some of the variation is explained by capacious baths, power showers and flush lavatories in the rich world. All humans, however, need a basic minimum of two litres of water in food or drink each day, and for this there is no substitute. No one survived in the ruins of Port-au-Prince for more than a few days after January’s earthquake unless they had access to some water-based food or drink. That is why many people in poor and arid countries—usually women or children—set off early each morning to trudge to the nearest well and return five or six hours later burdened with precious supplies.  That is why [Reason] many people believe water to be a human right, a necessity more basic than bread or a roof over the head.
From this much follows. One consequence is a widespread belief that no one should have to pay for water. [First Consequence] The Byzantine emperor Justinian declared in the sixth century that “by natural law” air, running water, the sea and seashore were “common to all”. Many Indians agree, seeing groundwater in particular as a “democratic resource”. In Africa it is said that “even the jackal deserves to drink”. [ Example of first Consequence?]
A second consequence is that water often has a sacred or mystical quality that is invested in deities like Gong Gong and Osiris and rivers like the Jordan and the Ganges.
[Second consequence] Throughout history, man’s dependence on water has made him live near it or organise access to it. Water is in his body—it makes up about 60%—and in his soul. It has provided not just life and food but a means of transport, a way of keeping clean, a mechanism for removing sewage, a home for fish and other animals, a medium with which to cook, in which to swim, on which to skate and sail, a thing of beauty to provide inspiration, to gaze upon and to enjoy. No wonder a commodity with so many qualities, uses and associations has proved so difficult to organise.

With all the respect to the economist, I think it is contestable that the human right to water causes either (1) the widespread belief that water is free or (2) that water is sacred and mystical.

Let’s discuss the first consequence. The economist is already quite prudent in not directly pointing out that human right to water means that water should be for free. Instead, it points out that human right to water makes people think that water should be free (a widespread belief). But is it true. Is it true that the human right to water makes people think that water should be free? It would require an empirical research to survey people’s opinion, not only about the human right to water, but also the term human rights in general. Is it true, that when something is labeled as “human rights”, then it should be free? This would make an interesting research in itself because it will have implications to human rights based access movements. My understanding is of course, that things which are labeled human rights, does not necessarily means that they are ‘free’. The right to education and the right to health are not free, although they are human rights. The right to vote is not free, because someone will have to provide and construct the ballots. Indeed, elections costs a lot.  

The examples of the first consequence is not really clear to me.  The second sentence (Justinian’s decree) does not really reinforce the assertion used on the main idea (human right to water causes the widespread belief that water should be free). But the sentence does provide an understanding that in the past people once regard water as ‘common to all’. This is correct. What is not correct is when they are tied to the main assertion. There is no relation between the human right to water and Justinian’s decree that water is a res communis. The two are different things. To put it in different way: Justinian does not say that running water is common to all, because it is a human right.

Now let’s move on to the second consequence: the right to water makes sacred or mystical qualities attached into it. I am almost certain that this is not the case. The Ganges were there, and was considered sacred, long before the term “Human Rights” were invented.

Anyway, probably it is me the one who misunderstood the Economist’s paragraphs above. Do you have a better suggestion?



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Water companies duty to satisfy reasonable demands

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

 

 



Suppose you have just built a new home in a nice city. All your neighbours has water connection, unfortunately, the local water company refuse to extend their pipes into your property. Do you think they are acting against the law?

 

Before we argue on the basis of positive law, I will first raise the issue on what the law ‘should be’ : Do you think the law should obligate water companies to provide connections to consumer? To put it into other terms, can water companies refuse a connection request? If they can, under what basis?

 

The answer to the first question is ‘yes’. The reason is because water is a special kind of good. Many authors classify it into merit good and quasi public good, I do not wish to discuss this in a more detail. To illustrate, consider the differences of buying water from buying clothes. In buying clothes, you have a number of option, you can go either to debenhams, zara or marks & spencer. But for water, it is likely that you are stuck with only one company for the whole city. If that company refuses to trade, then you are doomed. This is what natural monopoly is all about in practice: consumer is stucked with few option or no option at all. Existing customer also find it difficult to exit from the market as no competitor is available in their local. So, unless the water company is regulated, they can do anything they want.

 

How should the law deals with this phenomenon?

 

The English Law obligates water companies to ‘satisfy reasonable demands’. This is what the Water Industry Act 1991 says:

 

Domestic connections
45Duty to make connections with main

(1) Subject to the following provisions of this section and to sections 46 and 47 below, it shall be the duty of a water undertaker (in accordance with section 51 below) to make a connection under this section where the owner or occupier of any premises in the undertaker’s area which—

(a)consist in the whole or any part of a building; or

(b)are premises on which any person is proposing to erect any building or part of a building,

serves a notice on the undertaker requiring it, for the purpose of providing a supply of water for domestic purposes to that building or part of a building, to connect a service pipe to those premises with one of the undertaker’s water mains.

(2)Where a notice has been served for the purposes of this section, the duty imposed by subsection (1) above shall be a duty, at the expense of the person serving the notice, to make the connection required by the notice if—

(a)the main with which the service pipe is required to be connected is neither a trunk main nor a water main which is or is to be used solely for the purpose of supplying water otherwise than for domestic purposes; and

(b)such conditions as the undertaker may have imposed under sections 47 to 50 below have been satisfied;

and, subject to section 51 below, that duty shall arise whether or not the service pipe to which the notice relates has been laid when the notice is served.

(3)A notice for the purposes of this section—

(a)shall be accompanied or supplemented by all such information as the undertaker may reasonably require; and

(b)if the notice has effect so that a requirement is imposed on the undertaker by virtue of section 46(4) below, shall set out the matters that have given rise to the imposition of that requirement;

but, subject to section 51(5) below and without prejudice to the effect (if any) of any other contravention of this subsection, a failure to provide information in pursuance of the obligation to supplement such a notice shall not invalidate that notice.

(4)The duty imposed on a water undertaker by this section shall be owed to the person who served the notice by virtue of which the duty arises.

(5)Where a duty is owed by virtue of subsection (4) above to any person, any breach of that duty which causes that person to sustain loss or damage shall be actionable at the suit of that person; but, in any proceedings brought against a water undertaker in pursuance of this subsection, it shall be a defence for the undertaker to show that it took all reasonable steps and exercised all due diligence to avoid the breach.

(6)Where a water undertaker carries out any works which it is its duty under this section to carry out at another person’s expense, the undertaker shall be entitled to recover from that person an amount equal to the expenses reasonably incurred by the undertaker in carrying out the works.

(7)Nothing in this section or in sections 46 to 51 below shall impose any duty on a water undertaker to connect a service pipe to any premises with a service pipe to any other premises.

(8)In the following provisions of this Chapter a notice served for the purposes of this section is referred to as a connection notice.

 

 

Now let’s see what the Indonesian Law ( Government Regulation 16 Year 2005) suggests:

 


Hak dan Kewajiban Penyelenggara
Pasal 68

 

(2) Setiap penyelenggara berkewajiban untuk:
a. menjamin pelayanan yang memenuhi standar yang ditetapkan;
b. memberikan informasi yang diperlukan kepada semua pihak yang berkepentingan
atas kejadian atau keadaan yang bersifat khusus dan berpotensi akan
menyebabkan perubahan atas kualitas dan kuantitas pelayanan;
c. mengoperasikan sarana dan memberikan pelayanan kepada semua
pemakai/pelanggan yang telah memenuhi syarat, kecuali dalam keadaan memaksa
(force majeure);
d. memberikan informasi mengenai pelaksanaan pelayanan;
e. memberikan ganti rugi yang layak kepada pelanggan atas kerugian yang
dideritanya;
f. mengikuti dan mematuhi upaya penyelesaian secara hukum apabila terjadi
perselisihan; dan
g. berperanserta pada upaya perlindungan dan pelestarian sumber daya air dalam
rangka konservasi lingkungan.
(3) Pemberian ganti rugi sebagaiman dimaksud pada ayat (2) huruf e diupayakan
berdasarkan penyelesaian di luar pengadilan atau melalui pengadilan.
(4) Upaya penyelesaian di luar pengadilan sebagaimana dimaksud pada ayat (3)
dilakukan dengan arbitrase atau

 

Sorry for non English speakers. Article 68(2) of GR 16/2005 regulates the  obligations of a water undertaker in Indonesia. Unfortunately, the obligations they owed is only towards existing customers. I am unable to find any provisions obligating the undertakers to extend their pipes to prospective customers. There is, however, a general obligation for the Regional Government to provide water services to citizens in their locale (See Art. 40.c).

 

Hence, if you complain why your water company refuse to extend their pipes to your newly erected building or homes, the law may not be on your side. Sorry :(

 

Related Posts:

Indonesian Water Services Suffering from a Lack of Governance

Supreme Court Decision on Water Monopoly in Batam 

Missing water and shadow users
Troubled Waters: Confronting the Water Crisis in Australia’s Cities (Free Ebook)
14 Disturbing Facts about Jakarta's Water


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14 Disturbing Facts about Jakarta's Water

Tuesday, May 4, 2010



Video: Kruha

The Jakarta Globe runs a special edition about Jakarta's Water last year and wrap them nicely in a downloadable PDF. I will sum up the statistics quoted by the globe in this Water special edition:


1. 20% of Jakartans have no access to toilet
2. 35 million people expected to be living and using water in Greater Jakarta by 2020
3. 60% less spending on infrastructure as a proportion of GDP than In Suharto's era
4. 140 elephants the weight of raw sewage goes into Jakarta's ground or waterways daily
5. 400,000 liters of waste dumped In the capital's rivers or canals everyday
6. 25cm some parts of Jakarta sink every year
7. $5.8 billion is Indonesia's annual economic and health cost for poor sanitation
8. 40% of homes in Jakarta have no piped water
9. 50% of treated water leaks out before getting to users
10. 20,000 squatters living on the banks of Pluit reservoir
11. 56,000 households flush their sewage straight into the ground
12. $600 low-end cost to connect a home to piped sewage system
13. 20% of the city’s daily waste ends up in local rivers, reducing their flow rate up to 50%
14. 150cm depth the city has sunk in some parts over the last decade

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What do we mean by 'regulatory governance'?

Thursday, April 1, 2010


The origin of this whole governance debate can be found in the 'grandfather-paper' of this topic written by Levy and Spiller (1994). The 1994 paper distinguishes "regulatory content" (as in technical regulation dealing with the input, process and output) from "regulatory governance arrangement "which focuses on restraining the regulator's discretion. The governance arrangement deals with among other, how predictable the regulatory law is and the track record of the courts in hearing and settling disputes impartially. So the focus of the governance debate is on the commitment of the state in regulating and in constraining the discretion of the regulator. It appears to me that the focus is more on the investor side of the regulation, and not really on the consumer side. 

When privatization was carried out in the UK during the 90s, experts considered that in practice, it is hard to stick to the black letter of the regulatory mandate. The mandate, according to them, has to be continuously reinterpreted. In fact, as we can see many English legislation, regulatory mandate always contain some 'public interest' clause, which broadens the scope of discretion.

Legal scholars such as Graham and Prosser thus considered that the regulator is responsible for, not only in performing regulation in technical sense, but also in furthering social objectives. This duty is both implicit (such as found in the public interest clauses) and explicit in the regulatory mandate. 

Back to the governance debate.

When Levy and Spiller (1994, above) argued that regulatory governance is primarily about restraining regulatory discretion, 1997 papers onward (for example, this one) considered that some discretion is inevitable instead, especially when it comes to the regulation of industries with rapid tech-changes. Of course, these papers still focus on the investor protection side of the debate. 

However, recent literature on governance pays more attention to the consumer side of the regulation, rather the investor side. Consider for example, Dunleavy's seminal paper "New Public Management is Dead -- Long Live Digital Era Governance" which argued that people are no longer a passive recipient of a public service, but also an actor and a partner. Other literature argued that the case where customer has no say on how the store is run, is no longer the trend. Disempowering customer from regulation has, in many instances, produces failures. For example, a steep increase in water tariff results in inability to pay. Inability to pay leads to disconnection. Disconnection leads to unpaid investment (in installing water meters and extending  pipelines to household) and in water theft. Water theft and unpaid investments leads to even higher tariffs. Finally, in the end of the day, the whole system collapse. 

Thus, the literature suggests the shifting trend from customer paradigm-- where they are a passive recipient of the service into citizen paradigm, where people are involved in the decision making process in service delivery (for example, in setting tariffs). How this is done (see paper), is through accountability, transparency and participation mechanisms. This is the new focus of the recent regulatory governance debate.

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The Bonn Charter for Safe Drinking Water

Friday, March 19, 2010

  According to the WHO website :

The IWA Bonn Charter for Safe Drinking Water sets out the principles of an effective drinking water quality management framework and the responsibilities of key parties. The Charter presents a framework for drinking water safety, which incorporates the development of water safety plans. The goal of the Charter is good safe drinking water that has the trust of consumers.

Click here to download International Water Association (IWA) Bonn Charter of 2004. The pfd links to this charter is broken in many websites, so the document is rather difficult to obtain online. Fortunately watsan.net kept a copy of it.

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End of natural monopoly in the water sector?

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Michael Pritchard demonstrated his Lifesaver Bottle that can turn filthy water into drinkable water in a matter of second. The portable lifesaver filter is said to have 15 nanometer pores, small enough to filter viruses. The running cost to produce 25.000 litres of water through a Jerrycan equipped with Livesafer filter is 0.5 cents per day.

If the technology develops and applied to drinking water infrastructure, we may soon say goodbye to natural monopoly in the water sector. Treatment costs will go significantly low making any household eligible to build their own treatment facilities so long as water sources are available.







This could be a bad news for water companies of course :)

Regulations on water services will need to accommodate the possibilities for liberalising the water sector.

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Transparency in water utilities

Monday, March 23, 2009

I argued in my newspaper op-ed that the natural monopoly character of water services justifies its transparency. The purpose of water services regulation is to reduce natural monopoly and decreases information asymmetry. Transparency mechanisms work in that direction by allowing information to be interpreted by competing interest groups, thereby enhancing the regulator's capacity in deciphering information and producing more qualified decisions. Read more.

Economists have agreed that in every regulatory case, governments can never attain the same level of information as the company. Companies always know more about their own situation compared with the governments that regulates them.

The danger with this information asymmetry is that companies may inflate their actual costs and pass it on to consumers to pay. They may choose to deal with particular suppliers related to them (possibly a subsidiary of their parent company) rather than other suppliers offering lower prices.They may refuse to expand their network to slums or scarcely populated areas citing the reason of lack of capacity, although they actually can. Or, companies may conflate the number of leakages to add to the cost component.

As a result, governments must then be very well-equipped to be able to regulate water companies effectively; they must have all the technical, financial and legal auditing capability to discern and decipher information about water utility. The problem in most developing countries is that governments lack these regulatory capacities both in terms of human resources, technology and budget.

One way to mitigate this problem is by introducing transparency to the sector. Stakeholders can complain if they know that the company prefers to strike a water supply deal with real estate developers rather than invest in poor areas.

Potential suppliers can complain that they have been discriminated against, despite their ability to supply with cheaper costs. With transparency, governments can have help in interpreting information from other water companies, creditors, suppliers, consumers, NGOs, academia, the press or other interested parties.

However, it is difficult to make water utility companies agree to transparency. This response is natural as it is always better for them to conceal information than to be transparent.
Companies protect their information through confidentiality clauses in contracts and through trade secret laws. Freedom of Information laws typically do not work as they provide a blanket exception to disclosure when it comes to commercial confidentiality.

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“Obstruction of performance” under Article 86(2) of the EC Treaty and its application to the water sector

Thursday, January 15, 2009

My master thesis attempts to define "Obstruction of performance" under Article 86(2) of the EC Treaty and how this category can be applied to the water industry. The thesis argued that Obstruction of performance has to be narrowly interpreted and necessity/proportionality of the measure has to be taken into account in order to invoke "Services of General Economic Interest" (SGEI) justification under the EC Treaty. Comparing with electricity and gas sector, I conclude that specific situations in the water industry may justify its exclusion from general EC Competition rule. Scenarios where "obstruction" in the water industry occurs were explored.

Preiview:
Provision of water and sewerage services has traditionally lies upon the responsibilty of the state for ages. Internal market integration and liberalisation processes so far had always exclude water sector from its agenda. Even until today, there has been no sectoral regulation adopted by the EU concerning liberalisation of water and sewerage services. The Parliament in its Resolution makes clear of its position that it rejects water being put in a sectoral directive due to its regional characteristics, but calls for “…without going as far as liberalisation, for water supply to be ‘modernised' with economic principles in accordance with quality and environment standards and the needs of efficiency”.

However, the Comission had shown its interest in liberalising water and sewerage service. The annual turnover of the water sector in EU is estimated at 80 billion Euro, more than the turnover of the gas sector. The Commission has expressed concerns that horizontal and vertical restrictions from long term supply dealings “…may be harmful and contrary to EC law even where national law allows them”. In its internal market strategy for 2003-2006, water is listed as one of the area where” new action may be required”, by reviewing legal and administrative situation in the water and waste-water sector, which include an analysis of the competition aspects.

Download the full thesis here.

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Safeguarding Water Contracts (peer-reviewed version)

Saturday, December 8, 2007

Abstract:

The The provision of water and sewerage services has been in the public sector for thousands of years. However, the trend towards privatising these basic services has recently been growing. When dealing with Multinational Corporations (MNCs), governments face risks in the form of legal asymmetries.

This paper explains the theory and practice of water privatisation in Indonesia. It analyses the legal anatomy of privatisation, from the regulatory to the contractual levels. It attempts to highlight important issues and risks that governments and other stakeholders need to focus on when dealing with privatisation.

We've made some significant editing for this version. Download the full paper here.

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Jakarta's water problem

Friday, October 26, 2007

Pfff, check this out:

In my recent visit to Jakarta I found out that things are worse than I had envisaged. What I have feared has become reality. Lands in northern parts of Jakarta have subsided. Jakarta bypass has subsided by 50 centimeters since it was laid. The deep wells in Jakarta have to go deeper and deeper to produce water, and their output has been dropping off with time and many wells have been producing undrinkable water. Seawater has infiltrated as far as 7.5 kilometers from the coastline into the land and corrupted the groundwater such that it has become undrinkable.

Hopefully their mitigation plan works.

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Concession markets in Indonesia

Monday, September 10, 2007

Here's a link to an OECD article on the role of KPPU in supervising concession markets in Indonesia and other set of regulatory framework. This article only discusses the peripherals, but is nevertheless not bad as a start.

Download here.

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Poor water infrastructure in Kupang?

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Have a look at this reader's comment on the Jakarta Post 28/08:

Money from the water budget seems to be spent improperly every year. Kupang does not have even the simplest water treatment plant, while poor maintenance has caused the deterioration of old PDAM infrastructure for years.

The result is that people have to buy water from tanker trucks that has been pumped from highly polluted rivers and wells.

Several tests have shown this water is not fit for human consumption. But it's still being sold by the Kupang city administration.


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Water war is a class war

Monday, August 20, 2007

That one is column at The Globalist. The author wrote:

For some, water is effectively granted as a right, provided at low cost by the state. For many others — usually those who can least afford it — it is treated as a commodity that must be bought. Access to water is in fact much more closely tied to social class than to climate. In this sense, the conflicts arising from water scarcity are class wars.

He also explained that urbanization will be the main cause for water conflict:

First, there are real engineering challenges: the scale and pace of contemporary urbanization is much greater than in the past. And many slums are growing in places vulnerable to catastrophic change: floodplains or steep hillsides.

Second, because urbanization today is in many places occurring without economic growth, governments in the Global South often lack the resources to undertake such large infrastructure projects and are dependent on global markets for financing. But the global political climate today is much less friendly to large state-driven projects.

I have discussed the link between urbanization and water infrastructure here.

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"Your" water, "their" tribunal. BITs in water privatizations

You don't believe me? There is more than one case, really. I want to get back to that Tanzanian water privatization case, as reported by the Guardian:

Lawyers for Tanzania's government, whose participation in such a tribunal process is among the terms of a bilateral investment treaty signed with Britain in 1994, argue that Biwater failed in its contractual obligations, performing worse than its inefficient state-owned predecessor. If the government was to meet its citizens' need for safe water, it too had no choice, they claim, but to terminate the City Water arrangement just 22 months into what was meant to be a 10-year contract.

Now, you think the government can do anything once such dispute arises?
Despite the secrecy of proceedings - the tribunal is closed to the public, and Biwater sought and was granted a ruling that both parties refrain from speaking publicly to the media during the week-long hearing that finally began in The Hague in April - a host of interested parties will be closely monitoring the outcome in the wake of final arguments submitted as proceedings wrapped up in July.The World Bank, which pressed Tanzania to enter into the contract, now faces the possibility of seeing the country penalised in a tribunal of the bank's own creation.
Voila. "Your" water, "their" tribunal. A state is not that 'sovereign' when dealing with investors.

And check this info too:
According to a new report published by the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies, and Food and Water Watch, there are more than 2,500 bilateral investment treaties today, compared to 385 in 1989. And of the 255 investor-state lawsuits filed under these treaties, more than two-thirds have been lodged in the past four years.
There is a way to get around BIT, withdraw! But of course, other investors might pull back too. So this could be a middle way: Can we create a non applicability clause in BITs for water privatisation?


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The Tanzania Water Privatization Problem

Saturday, August 18, 2007

Guardian issued an interesting article elaborating the Dar-es-Salam Water Privatization problem:
At 11.30am on June 1 2005, three British expatriates were detained by the police in Tanzania. Cliff Stone, Michael Livermore and Roger Harrington were the senior managers at City Water, a consortium responsible for managing Dar es Salaam's water supply. After being held for several hours, the men were served with notices describing them as "undesirable immigrants" and told to leave the country.

I do not know the privatization scheme of Dar-es-Salam water service, but it appears to me that they are using a leasing scheme, where the authority retains ownership of the infrastructure (plus doing some administrative work) and the private operator runs the water treatment, extend network, and in this case, do the billing.

There is one contractual issue that I would like to highlight in this Dar-es-Salam case:

City Water repeatedly complained to the Tanzanian water ministry that its bid was based on flawed information supplied by Dawasa. According to a subsequent World Bank report, signed by the bank's then-president, Paul Wolfowitz, City Water stopped paying its monthly fee for leasing Dawasa's piping and other infrastructure in July 2004, less than a year into the contract. The company was also insisting that its operating fee be raised.

Asked by Dawasa to assess if this was justified, auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers and the British engineering consultants Howard Humphreys rejected City Water's arguments. (Biwater, for its part, directs blame at Dar es Salaam's water authority, saying that Dawasa had "barely started" big capital-works projects on which rehabilitation of the system depended.)

In infrastructure projects, it is common to assume that the local authority knows more about the condition of the installations, more than the investors. The investor then makes the bid (and calculate the prices) based on these estimates. And then, if they won the bid, the contract is concluded. What can make things worse is if the investor puts some clauses on the contract, making the authority liable for imperfect or inaccurate information they supplied to investors. In the Tanzania case above, the Govt was lucky because the PwC audit confirm that they were correct. But what if the result is otherwise?

Some lessons for government's lawyers:
  1. Make sure the client makes proper disclosures
  2. Find a way to get around with the clause that puts the burden of liability on the client's shoulder, for giving inaccurate information
  3. Put a clause that the counterpart is also responsible for their own judgement, in addition to information supplied by the client
  4. Find a win-win solution if a case on imperfect information arise, in any event, avoid the Court