Energy key to country’s progress in next 40 years: Authority

ENERGY is the country’s key enabler in its progress over the next 40 years, says National Energy Authority managing director Ronald Meketa.
The authority received K2 million from the Department of National Planning and Monitoring yesterday.
Meketa said some key elements for the country’s development were cheap energy and labour.
“If we can bring reliable power and energy for our investors, especially in downstream processing such as major agro-economics, that’s where we can keep Papua New Guineans busy,” he said.
“As the regulatory (body), we are here to assist the national power company PNG Power.
“They have been struggling in their smaller centres.”
Meketa said the authority was going to assist PNG Power by offloading community-based services to interested independent power producers.
“We got the PNG concept where the electricity and communications will be running parallel.”