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Guidelines for using gas development fund soon
10 December 2010: The Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) is likely to announce its decision on the proposed gas development fund (GDF) soon.
Complying with a BERC directive, the Petrobangla created the GDF from its additional income that came after the rise of gas price.
The accumulative amount of the GDF is about Tk 900 crore. But the money remained unutilized because of a lack of concrete policy guidelines.
While approving a Petrobangla proposal on 30 July 2009 to raise the gas price by an average 11.22 percent, the BERC directed the state-owned agency to create the GDF.
The energy sector watchdog body also directed the Petrobangla to spend the money under a policy guideline to be approved by the BERC.
In the last one and half months, Petrobangla was unable to prepare any policy guideline for the GDF. Recently it placed a proposed guideline and the BERC organized public hearings on the matter to take opinions of stakeholders.
BERC will recommend forming a high level committee in Petrobangla to spend the money under a specific programme and also forming a monitoring committee comprising representatives of energy and finance ministries to oversee the spending, according to sources. BERC also may pass an order to Petrobangla to place its reports on a regular basis on GDF utilization to keep the watchdog body informed about the spending of GDF.
Source: Bangladeshinfo