Participation of private sector stressed

The private sector participation in the operation and maintenance of the bridge could provide an effective support to the government and donor agencies, they said.

The Padma Bridge will be the largest bridge of the country with a total length of 5.58 km followed by the 4.8 km long Jamuna Bridge. The four lanes bridge will connect Mawa on the east bank with Zajira on the west bank of the river.

The workshop titled 'The PMBP under Public Private Partnership Participation' was organised by the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge Authority (JMBA) at the Sheraton hotel in the city.

Communications Secretary Shafiqul Islam inaugurated the workshop as the chief guest while country director of Asian Development Bank (ADB) Hua Du spoke as special guest.

Describing various impacts of the bridge, including country's socio-economic development and reduce vulnerability of the isolated population living in the southwest regions, Shafiqul said that the government could bear 20 to 25 percent of the total cost of the bridge and ADB, WB and JIBC have shown their interest to provide support.

Hua Du said that the ADB may provide nearly 300 million US dollar for the project and it could provide 25 million US dollar within this year as a technical loan for drafting the design of the bridge by 2008.

Presently, the ADB is reviewing the environment and financial feasibility study, which was conducted by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) earlier.

The feasibility study estimated that the cost will be nearly 1.2 billion US dollar but presently ADB said that it may reach up to 1.4 billion US dollar, communication ministry sources said.

Presided over by the Executive Director of JMBA Khan M Ibrahim Hossain, the inaugural function was also addressed by Acting Country Director of the World Bank Mohammad Al Housseuni Toure and Representative of Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JIBC) Shinsuke Nagai.

Three keynote papers on different aspect of private public partnership in the PMBP were presented at the daylong workshop.

A keynote paper said that the PMBP could provide better inland transport system, link in the Trans-Asian Highway System, additional rail link for more efficiency and effective support service in case of any disaster.