Checking Corruption in the Electricity Sector

Date: Thursday, April 06, 2006

Time: 12:30-2:00 PM

Speakers: Mohinder Gulati, Lead Energy Specialist, EASEG, the World Bank Group; and Mark Yeshwanth Rao, Management Consultant, and a key member of the PwC India Government Reforms & Institutional Development (GRID) Group.

Description: Rough estimates of corruption in developing countries' electricity sector are placed at US$40--45 billion per year. Electricity is probably the most versatile, widely used and consumer friendly form of energy. Life in a large part of the world would be unthinkable without electricity. Often electricity is supplied by state owned monopolies, which are used as instruments of government's political, social, and economic objectives, thereby obfuscating the commercial objectives of the utilities. In the process the management controls, transparency of their operations and accountability of the utility managers gets diluted. Gradually this can lead to corruption, inefficiency, overstaffing, poor standards of supply and service, poor financial performance of the utilities and fiscal burden on the state. Bankrupt utilities are not able to expand network and services; fiscal burden on the government crowds out expenditure on public services; both hurt the poor more than others. The BBL would present a draft paper on corruption in electricity sector. The paper provides a diagnosis and points of vulnerability to corruption; and discusses strategies for combating corruption.

Materials:

For additional information, please contact Maks Kobonbaev.

Presentation