THE MINISTRY of Water and Housing, the National Water Commission (NWC) and the French Embassy have signed five contracts for the Great River/Lucea Water Supply Project. The project, which is being financed by private investors at a cost of approximately US$39 million, is scheduled for completion in 18 months, following the ground-breaking exercise which will take place later this month.
In his address at the signing at the French Embassy on Tuesday, Donald Buchanan, Minister of Water and Housing, said the occasion was historic because it represented "the fruition of the first real attempt at private sector co-operation with the Government and the NWC in our capital investment programme."
The Minister said the project was born out of co-operation with the French company SOGEA, which won the tender for construction of the Logwood Treatment plant in Negril in 1996. He noted that despite the challenges of financing the Logwood project, the firm had been very co-operative in establishing that plant and proposed to finance yet another project on behalf of the Jamaican Government.
"I want to make it absolutely clear that this entire arrangement has been transparent and can stand up to any security," the Minister declared. He explained that upon receiving the proposal, the NWC engaged independent engineers to review the rates and following subsequent recommendations the NWC entered into negotiations with the French company.
Minister Buchanan pointed out that the arrangement had been approved by the National Contracts Commission and the Cabinet, and that the savings realised by the NWC would be used to improve water supply service in Hanover.
The Minister told the gathering that he was "acutely aware" that some US$2.2 billion was needed to make islandwide water access a reality and that the current project was a modest, but significant part of that endeavour.
The signatories to the contracts were contractors SOGEA-SATOM, consultants FIWI Corporation, in addition to financiers National Commercial Bank (NCB), Trafalgar Development Bank, Pan Caribbean Financial Services, and French bank, BNP Paribas.
The Great River, St. James Water Supply Project will feature the construction of a treatment plant for potable water with a capacity of 22.5 million litres per day and the construction of a pipeline approximately 25 kilometres of ductile iron pipe to Lucea, Hanover. The entire interior of Hanover will be supplied from this plant. Arrangements have already been made for the connection of the existing tanks in Tamarind Hill, McQuerry, Seaview, Sandy Bay, Flint River and Lucea.
The feasibility studies for the project were financed by the French Government in 2001. In 1997, the French Government also signed a contract for the construction of a water treatment plant in Logwood, Negril and in 2001, the plant, which has a capacity of 33.7 million litres of water per day, was commissioned.
French Ambassador to Jamaica, Pierre-Antonie Berniard, told the gathering that the Logwood plant, for which SOGEA had also been the contractor, had been completed within the stipulated time and budget.
