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ublicly listed construction firm PT Waskita Karya saw its contracts for overseas projects increase in the first three months of the year, largely supported by its expansion in Timor Leste and Middle Eastern countries.

Waskita corporate secretary Haris Gunawan told The Jakarta Post over the weekend that the state-run firm had secured a total Rp 3.5 trillion (US$306.5 million) worth of new contracts between January and March, about a quarter of which or Rp 879 billion are overseas projects.

The figure is a surge compared to the first quarter of last year, when its overseas projects stood at Rp 57 billion, less than 2 percent of its total Rp 3.3 trillion in new contracts.

The Rp 879 billion worth of new contracts for overseas projects secured so far this year means that Waskita has reached nearly 70 percent of its Rp 1.3 trillion foreign contract target.

While a large chunk of Waskita's new foreign contracts come from the expansion of Suai Airport in neighboring Timor Leste, which is contributing Rp 875.9 billion to the company, Haris said that most of the foreign construction work it handled, which is currently in progress, were based in the Middle East.

'Most of our overseas construction projects are in the Middle East, as we had previously collaborated with the Bin Laden group on several projects there. In the future, we will focus on expanding our operations in the Middle East and Timor Leste, as both areas still hold many opportunities,' Haris said.

Waskita has been working with the Saudi Arabian construction conglomerate, the Bin Laden Group, for the past five years, in a collaboration that has helped the company win several projects in the Gulf country, including the high-profile expansion of the Al Masjid Al Haram Mosque in Mecca.

Dubbed the Maktaf Capacity Project, the project is 80 percent complete and is expected to accommodate more haj pilgrims in the grand mosque. It earned Waskita contracts worth Rp 64.41 billion in 2013.

Aside from the Suai Airport and the Maktaf Capacity Project, Waskita is also working on the construction of the Jeddah flyover, which earned the company total contracts of Rp 79.4 billion last year.

Waskita, as previously reported, is also eyeing the renovation of the Al Masjid Al Nabawi Mosque in Medina to further boost its reputation in the Middle East. There are no details, however, about the value of the project.

Haris said the company's overseas expansion was primarily useful in generating cash while disbursing relatively low costs.

'Basically, our foreign expansion plans are designed to be a training ground for our workers to become familiar with the know-how in construction abroad as well as to gain experiences,' Haris explained.

'Such projects also bring us positive cash, meaning that we don't have to disburse money from our headquarters here to finance them.'

The positive cash generated from the foreign projects is expected to generate growth amid a slowdown in Indonesia's construction industry, discouraged by the country's legislative and presidential elections, as well as its weak macroeconomic conditions.

Construction research center BCI Asia - Indonesia, for instance, previously estimated that the country's construction sector may secure 14.7 percent in growth of new contracts, reaching Rp 493 trillion this year. This figure would be a sizable decline from last year, when the country booked a 39 percent increase in new contracts compared to the previous year.

To finance both its domestic and overseas projects, Waskita plans to spend about Rp 863 billion in capital expenditure this year, more than twice the Rp 400 billion it spent in 2013.

The construction company also aims to see its total contracts increase by 42 percent year-on-year to Rp 18.7 trillion.