Nine power firms, USAID sign electricity supply pact

All nine of the government-owned power distribution companies (DISCOs) signed agreements with US on Monday for $60 million assistance to implement the second phase of Power Distribution Improvement Program (PDIP) that will help improve energy supply to consumers. Under the signed agreements, US will help DISCOs to generate more revenue to pay for energy production, reduce losses in power distribution from the producer to the consumer, and make the power supply more reliable. Speaking on the occasion, Director of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Energy Office, John Morgan said, “By improving collection of energy bills, DISCOs will have more money to pay for power generation, thus reducing load-shedding in the country”. USAID financed three-year PDIP was initiated in September 2010. The first phase started with the in-depth operational audits of each DISCOs to establish baseline information that could be used to measure improvement in performance over time. The audits covered governance, operational, financial, human resources, communications and customer service areas and surfaced opportunities for fundamental improvement in all areas. Second phase focuses on implementing specific performance improvement action plans at each DISCO, to fully empower them over operational control of its business systems, expansion planning, investment prioritisation, human resource management, and commercialisation of electric service. The action plan will reduce theft, improve commercial control of operations, and reduce technical and non-technical losses.The programme focuses on improving governance without which power theft cannot be curbed. Theft control requires improved data management, including ensuring that all consumers are formally registered, metered and billed. An efficient commercial management would be established to ensure revenue recovery. While advanced metering technologies will be introduced like automated meter reading and prepayment meters. Implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system will be made mandatory to improve revenue enhancement. USAID will help DISCOs modernise equipment, provide expert consultations, and support the introduction of various international best practices to ensure a more reliable supply of power to consumers. In addition to improved energy distribution, USAID is also helping government in restoring and increasing its energy production capacity, and to introduce long-term energy sector reforms.