Necessary construction work yet to be finished

Tenure of the Shahjalal Fertiliser Project (SFP) in Fenchuganj of Sylhet is likely to be extended by one year as necessary construction work at the project site is yet to be completed, officials said.

The overall construction of the SFP was supposed to be finished by June, 2015, they said adding that the works of the project can now be completed by June, 2016.

The ministry of industries (MoI) has recently sent a letter to the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) to extend the tenure of the project, an IMED official said.

Bangladesh Chemical Industries Corporation (BCIC) will construct the housing colony, set up gas supply line and rehabilitate the existing school, college and market of the area with government fund.

However, expenditure of the project will not increase even though the tenure is extended, a high official of the MoI said.

Contractor of the project will finish all kinds of fixed works subject to scope of doing work by June 2015, according to the official.

The MoI is implementing the Tk 54.09 billion (5,409 crore) project with technical assistance from the United States and the Netherlands and financial support from China.

China provided Tk 39.87 billion in loans to be repaid in 20 years at a 2.0 per cent interest rate. The rest of the fund came from the Bangladesh government.

The production capacity of the SFP is 580,800 tonnes of granular urea per annum, according to the BCIC.

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