USAID-Sponsored Training Program on Competitive Electricity Retail Markets Begins

June 12, 2006

New Delhi – A U.S. government sponsored training program for officials and personnel from key stakeholders in India’s electricity sector began here today. With the overall objective of bringing further improvement in India’s power sector and strengthening its economy, the program will expose the participants to the ongoing changes in the electricity sector toward a competitive retail market.

The two-day training program and Executive Session is funded by the United States Agency for International Development’s South Asia Regional Initiative for Energy (SARI/E). The program is designed to provide a comprehensive overview of electricity markets including the role of different key stakeholders in the operations of the marketplace and how energy market transactions are made.

A competitive retail electricity market would strengthen India’s economy by creating a platform that encourages cost effective production, use and sale of electricity throughout the country. This would assist the country in reducing the pervasive electricity shortfalls by providing incentives to generators to increase efficiencies and output. Electricity markets worldwide have been proven to reduce investor risk through resource diversification and improved cost-recovery. In India, a competitive electricity market will help to attract the significant private sector investment needed to fuel the country’s fast pace of economic growth.

The half-day Executive Session is scheduled for June 14, 2006 and will open with a keynote address from Professor S. L. Rao, former Chairman of the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission. The session will also include presentations on the benefits of competitive electricity markets and availability based tariffs by local experts, as well as by SARI/Energy specialists.

The training and executive session are part of a series of SARI/Energy activities under the Energy Markets Initiative launched in 2005. Under the initiative Indian delegates will join their peers from South Asia on a peer exchange to Southern Africa later this month, where they will have the opportunity to interact with members of the Southern Africa power pool. This will be followed by another electricity markets training activity on Electricity Portfolio Management in August.

The USAID’s SARI/Energy operates in eight countries -- Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Begun in 2000, the program focuses on approaches to meeting South Asia’s energy security needs through increased trade, investment and access to clean energy.