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French water utility company SUEZ announced that its consortium with Segor, SCET Group and BIAT has been awarded a contract by ONAS (National Office of Sanitation of Tunisia) to operate the public wastewater treatment service for the governorates of Sfax, Gabès, Medenine and Tataouine serving approximately 960,000 residents.
The 10-year, €200 million concession is the first public-private partnership (PPP) in the Tunisian water industry, SUEZ said in a press statement.
The statement, dated 21 April, said the contract encompasses the operation and maintenance (O&M) of 14 wastewater treatment plants with combined treatment capacity of 39 million cubic metres/year, 106 pumping stations and 1,900 km of pipelines.
It also provides for the renovation of existing wastewater treatment plants and additional work that will allow wastewater to be used for agriculture via tertiary water treatment processes such as ultraviolet light treatment and phosphorus removal.
The World Bank will finance the restoration and extension of this infrastructure, while the Tunisian government will fund its operation and maintenance, the statement said.
Sabrina Soussan, SUEZ Group’s Chief Executive Officer said: “This first public-private partnership in Tunisia is a concrete example of what SUEZ was advocating in New York at the United Nations Water conference: I called for greater cooperation between the public and private sectors to address water needs in the years to come. I am delighted with this contract, which bears witness to the trust placed in SUEZ by the Tunisian authorities.”
The project company is owned 80 percent by SUEZ. Tunisian engineering firm SCET and SEGOR (a joint venture between SCET and SUEZ) holds 12 percent while Tunisia’s largest private sector bank BIAT (Banque Internationale Arabe de Tunisie) holds the remaining 8 percent stake.
(Reporting by Anoop Menon; Editing by Bhaskar Raj)
