"We have set a target to generate sufficient electricity by the year 2010 to reach a level where there will be no load shedding," said Mirza Azizul Islam, finance and planning adviser, during the speech.

As a starter for this ambitious target, the caretaker government in its proposed Annual Development Programme (ADP) for 2007-08 allocated Tk 3,828 crore. This figure is 31 percent higher than that of the current fiscal year.

Power and energy allocation also claims 16.9 percent of the total ADP expenditure, which ranks second on the list, with local government and rural development expenditure being the first.

"We have planned to increase power generation over the next three years by 345 MW in the first year, 900 MW in the second and 1,050 MW in the third year," he said adding that policies have been formulated to purchase electricity from captive power plants owned by private sector.

The adviser said even though the demand for electricity has multiplied during the past few years, generation of power did not increase correspondingly. The government has taken short, medium and long term plans to meet the increasing demand, he added.

Currently, against a demand of around 5,200 MW, the country is generating around 3,300 MW to 3,500 MW power while the demands for power have been rising by 10 percent every year.

To ease the power crisis during summer, the adviser said the government is trying to minimise frequent load shedding through load management and separate policies have also been put in place for the outlying regions of the country.

The issue of maintenance of power plants was neglected in the past, he said adding that this government has taken initiatives to add 600 MW electricity to the national grid by the end of the year by completing maintenance work of old power generation plants.

Various departments of the government have also been instructed to watch their electric consumption as well, the adviser said.

Following the instructions, average use of electricity in the secretariat building alone has declined by 21 percent during February- May 2007 compared to the same period last year, he added.

Regarding the price of petroleum, he said losses by Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) due to differences in domestic and imported prices have swollen up in the past years and the outstanding loan of the BPC now stands at around Tk 8,000 crore.

Since April 2007, the government has taken steps to readjust prices of petroleum products to make it consistent with international prices as much as possible. A subsidy of Tk 600 crore in total has been provided to BPC to maintain a steady flow of petroleum import, the adviser added.

The adviser also said the government has decided to assume the accumulated default loan of BPC as its own liability by issuing treasury bonds of the equivalent amount. He hoped that the issuance of treasury bonds would resolve the long-standing outstanding loan issue of BPC.