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Urban consumers owe Tk 3000 crore as bills to PDB

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December 13, 2000 

Dhaka-- (UNB)- Rural consumers are prompt in paying for electricity, but they are the people mostly denied access to power as an estimated 83 per cent population of the country still cry for it.

Rural area coverage so far achieved by Rural Electrification Board (REB), an autonomous body responsible for reaching electricity to villages, is only around 13 percent.

A conservative estimate of energy experts indicates if the present rate of performance goes, REB may need at least 50 years more to touch the rest of the villages and 100 years to cover the whole rural areas.

Officials in the REB said their recovery rate of power tariffs is almost cent percentage.

On the other hand, urban consumers, including industries, businesses and government offices, owe roughly Tk 3000 crore as electricity bills to Power Development Board.

Good payment record of rural power consumers has earned fame for REB, but nothing for themselves as their cry for electricity is often hushed by profit concern of Palli Bidyut Samities (PBS), nominated by REB to supply electricity to rural areas.

In the last 22 years, REB could reach electricity to 30,656 villages, fully or partly till September 2000, out of total roughly 65,000 villages.

REB could so far give some 3 million connections, including domestic, agricultural and small commercial ventures, through 55 PBSs building nearly 120,000km lines.

A senior REB official said they were now carrying out the fifth phase of the 1982 master plan to build 1.42 lakh km of rural distribution lines by 2005. He claimed the target, fixed up to 2000, had well been achieved.

“Reaching electricity to every household, you know, is a very gigantic task,” he said.

By the end of the terminal year of the extended master plan, REB is set to develop backbone infrastructure in 333 upazilas.

“Besides, we’re to prepare a new master plan to comply with the government vision of ‘electricity for all by 2020,’” the REB official said casting his eyes over a far future.

The Rural Electrification Board Ordinance 1977, that gave birth to the REB, entrusted it with building a smooth and steady rural power-distribution system to spur the rural economy and elevate standard of living of people in villages.

To support the Board to achieve its purpose, the government decided to give it electricity at a subsidised rate from PDB.

PDB sells per-unit electricity to REB at Tk 1.82 whereas the average selling price of PBSs to rural consumers is Tk 2.87 per unit.

According to official figures, PDB’s average generation cost is about Tk 3 per unit while it buys electricity from independent power producers at Tk 4 per unit. Average selling rate of PDB is Tk 2.17 per unit.

The bottom line is, PDB is counting a loss of Tk 1 to 2 for catering each unit to REB to support the noble cause of rural electrification.

“None takes this in account while making wholesale allegations against PDB for its loss,” a PDB official regretted. REB still owes nearly Tk 300 crore to PDB as assets and other bills, he added.

Price support, however, did not help PBSs to run viably, as only 13 out of 55 such samities are profitable. “We need to sell power at minimum Tk 3.50 per unit to reach a breakeven point,” a PBS manager was quoted as saying.

Initially financed by USAID and designed in US fashion, REB’s significant success, as often cited by World Bank and others, is its almost cent percent recovery of tariffs from poor rural consumers, mostly farmers.

Credit goes to PBSs, who take electrification as more of a business than a service, denying any concession to irrigation pumps even. PBSs have connections to some 82,666 irrigation pumps.

PDB is continuing tariff concession to whatever pumps it still have in its jurisdiction charging Tk 1.75 per unit, while PBSs take Tk 2.70 per unit.

Another success story in REB’s account, also referred by many as an instance of complacency, is its lower system loss compared to PDB and DESA.

REB suffers from an 18 percent system loss while PDB losses 36 per cent of its power in system faults and theft.

One may genuinely ask where REB’s system loss would stand if it were involved in generation and transmission systems also.

As per present arrangements, PDB reaches power from its own plants through its own transmission lines to REB’s doorstep. So chances of power loss in transmission process is slim in case of REB.

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