VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Minister of State Enterprises (BUMN) Rini Soemarmo has officially commissioned a 150 Kv Holtekamp electrical relay station and transmission cables in Jayapura designed to increase electrification ratio in Papua and West Papua.

"With the new transmission system, Papua is expected to have more supply of power," Rini said when commissioning the facility in Jayapura on Friday ( 24 August )

She said she hoped there would be no more blackouts in Papua and the people could receive sufficient supply of power. Electricity would help improve the people`s welfare and the children could study at home more conveniently , she said.

"With the electricity, children could study longer and the people could use electricity to support their business," shes aid.

Meanwhile Business Director of the Maluku and Papua branch of the state electricity company PLN Ahmad Rofiq said the government was set to increase electrification ration especially in eastern Indonesia. Ahmad Rofiq said the electrification ratio in Papua and West Papua was still low at 53.62 percent -- Papua 44.85 percent and West Papua 86.28 percent.

"In order to increase the ratio, PLN has a program of Bright Papua bu speeding up construction of infrastructure in rural areas," he said.

He said the geographical condition of Papua is a big challenge in the implementation of the program. (ant)

Minister of Transportation (Menhub) Budi Karya Sumadi said that the Indonesian government encourages the use of 50 percent of local components for infrastructure development, especially railways.

"We will intensify our train manufacturing industry, so that `local content` would increase. When we built the first `local content,` it was 30 percent; now it is 40 percent; and in the near future, with our State-Owned Enterprises Minister, we will increase it to above 50 percent," Sumadi stated here on Thursday.

He noted that according to President Joko Widodo`s mandate, domestic projects must use more local components.

By using more local components, many positive impacts would be obtained, including saving a lot of foreign exchange, absorbing many local personnel, and allowing export, he further stressed.

According to him, the railway project in Palembang has reached 40 percent of local components.

Regarding the Jakarta-Surabaya semi-fast train project, Sumadi remarked that he had sought reasonable prices and participation of domestic contractors. (ant)

Top ten of Medals on AG 2018. China remained at the top with with 116 medals ( 55 Golds ), Japan still at number 2 with 86 medals ( 25 Golds ) and number 3, South Korea with 63 medals ( 16 Golds ). Number 4 Iran with 27 medals ( 10 Golds ), Indonesia at number 5 with 24 medals ( 8 Golds ). Number 6 Thailand with 26 medals ( 6 Golds ), North Korea with 16 medals ( 6 Golds ), Chinese Taipei with 22 medals ( 5 Golds ), Usbekistan number 9 with 19 medals (  4 Golds ) and number 10, India with 18 medals ( 4 Golds ). sources: ( Inasgoc ). 

China still dominated the top 10 medals of AG 2018 with 83 medals ( 38 Golds ). Japan stayed behind China with 68 medal ( 20 Golds ) and Korea collected 49 medals ( 11 Golds ). Indonesia as host country of AG stayed at 5th rank with 17 medals ( 6 Golds ) after Islamic Republic of Iran who has collected 16 medals ( 7 Golds ). This is an updated of August 23, 2018 morning.