The pandemic has slowed down investment in the electricity sector, a government official has said.

The Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry’s electricity director general, Rida Mulyana, said several power plants, substations and transmissions infrastructure and other construction projects had been delayed because of the pandemic, leading to lower-than-expected investment in the sector.

“We hope the investment in the electricity sector will improve going forward,” Rida said during a virtual press conference on Thursday, adding that the energy ministry remained optimistic as pandemic restrictions were eased.

Investment in the electricity sector dropped 24.64 percent year on year (yoy) to US$4.22 billion, or 42.6 percent of the $9.91 billion targeted for this year, ministry data shows.

The $4.22 billion in total investment consists of $2.72 billion from state-owned electricity company PLN, $1.46 billion from independent power producers and $0.04 billion from private power utilities.

Read also: PLN books Rp 12.2 trillion net loss as COVID-19 proves double whammy

Among 15 performance indicators set by the ministry, discrepancy from the targets was widest for new power plant capacity realization, with only 936.63 megawatts in capacity added, or 15.1 percent of the 6,187 MW target set for 2021.

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