DUSHANBE, June 16, 2014, Asia-Plus  -- A number of projects related to a public-private partnership (PPR) have been submitted for consideration to the government.

Among them are projects aimed at construction and management of hydropower plants in the Basin of the Zeravshan River and establishment of the transport and logistics center in Tursunzoda for serving international trucking, an official source in the Tajik government told Asia-Plus in an interview.

“Besides, there are projects aimed at rehabilitation of the safe drinking water supply system, construction of railway and initial infrastructure within the Sughd Free Economic Zone (FEZ Sughd), and involvement of a skilled operator in management of Tajikistan’s power holding, Barqi Tojik,” the source.

According to him, these issues were discussed on June 13 at the first meeting on the public-private partnership took place in Dushanbe on June 13.  

The public–private partnership (PPP) is a government service or private business venture which is funded and operated through a partnership of government and one or more private sector companies.  PPP involves a contract between a public sector authority and a private party, in which the private party provides a public service or project and assumes substantial financial, technical and operational risk in the project. In some types of PPP, the cost of using the service is borne exclusively by the users of the service and not by the taxpayer.  In other types (notably the private finance initiative), capital investment is made by the private sector on the basis of a contract with government to provide agreed services and the cost of providing the service is borne wholly or in part by the government.  Government contributions to a PPP may also be in kind (notably the transfer of existing assets).  In projects that are aimed at creating public goods like in the infrastructure sector, the government may provide a capital subsidy in the form of a one-time grant, so as to make it more attractive to the private investors.  In some other cases, the government may support the project by providing revenue subsidies, including tax breaks or by removing guaranteed annual revenues for a fixed time period.

There are usually two fundamental drivers for PPPs. Firstly, PPPs are claimed to enable the public sector to harness the expertise and efficiencies that the private sector can bring to the delivery of certain facilities and services traditionally procured and delivered by the public sector. Secondly, a PPP is structured so that the public sector body seeking to make a capital investment does not incur any borrowing.