JAKARTA, April 25 (Xinhua) -- Indonesia has allocated some 2.53 trillion rupiah (about 190.5 million U.S. dollars) to finance projects aimed at assuring access of electricity in villages located in far-flung eastern region's provinces this year.
Most of the investment goes to provinces in Papua, an official said here on Tuesday.
Haryanto WS, business director of state-run power utility firm of PLN for Maluku and Papua, said provinces entitled to host the projects were North Maluku, Maluku, West Papua and Papua.
He said Papua and West Papua provinces would get 71.53 percent from the allocation due to higher number of villages and high operational cost for tough geographic condition.
He added the access to electricity projects would cover a total of 564 villages in those provinces with 365 of them in Papuan provinces.
The power generator systems designed to serve in those villages were solar cell and diesel powered generators, he added.
"Most of the nation's villages with lack of access to electricity were in Papua," he said, adding that at present 2,511 villages across the country are yet to have electricity access.
He was optimistic that the projects would be accomplished by the end of the year.
PLN expects to secure electricity access in 1,272 villages in Papua and 537 others in Maluku provinces by the end of 2019.
