ECN and Indonesia collaborate on energy policy formulation and capacity development

Indonesia faces huge challenges related to availability, affordability and sustainability of its energy supply. Addressing these challenges requires good policymaking and a sound knowledge basis in the country, in government, academia and on the technical level. ECN will help address these challenges in the CASINDO programme, which commenced in June. The website www.casindo.info was launched last week.

Following the resignation of President Soeharto in 1998, Indonesia has embarked on a process of social, political and economic reforms. A key component of these reforms is the introduction of regional autonomy; decentralisation of power and responsibilities from the central government in Jakarta to the local(province, district, municipality) government, including responsibilities for energy sector development. This means that regional governments are now responsible for formulating their energy policy and, consequently, must reform their institutional structure and strengthen their human capacity to be able to duly carry out this new responsibility.
Regions are very well aware of the importance of a sufficient, affordable and reliable energy supply for regional economic development in general and the alleviation of poverty in particular. Therefore, regions have requested for assistance in formulating and implementing their energy policies. The CASINDO programme aims to provide this assistance through developing institutional and human capacity that will enable the regions to develop sound energy policies and implement sustainable energy projects. CASINDO will be implemented in the provinces of North Sumatra, Central Java, Yogyakarta, West Nusa Tenggara and Papua.

School curricula on sustainale energy
The CASINDO capacity building activities will be conducted at the national, provincial and the district/municipality level for policy makers, entrepreneurs, NGOs, universities and for teachers at vocational schools. CASINDO will therefore not only provide capacity building for sustainable energy planning with national and regional government institutions. Applying the “train the trainer” principle, it will also develop university/vocational school curricula on sustainable energy as well. 
To achieve the CASINDO objectives, a consortium has been formed, consisting of a broad range of Indonesian and Dutch partners. Apart from ECN, the Technical University of Eindhoven and ETC Nederland are participating for The Netherlands; for Indonesia, the national Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (MEMR) and its regional branches (DINAS Energi), two national research and training institutes (ITB and TEDC) and five universities from the target provinces are the counterparts. The CASINDO programme is funded by the Dutch embassy in Jakarta through SenterNovem.

Casindo website
On 26 August 2009, the CASINDO website www.casindo.info was launched. The website contains information on the activities, results, events and partners of the CASINDO programme that ECN will implement for the next 2.5 years in Indonesia.

For more information, contact Nico van der Linden (n.vanderlinden@remove-this-part-ecn.nl) who is based in Indonesia or Koen Smekens (smekens@remove-this-part-ecn.nl) based in Petten

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