The shortage of manpower is delaying the Phuentshogling township development project along the Amochhu. The project, by far is the biggest urban development project in the country. It is estimated to cost Nu 21bn. And it is going to take 18 years to complete.
The Phuentshogling township development project would reclaim nearly 1200 acres of land, equivalent to more than seven hundred football fields. The work started in November 2018.
But the pandemic put a brake on the progress since March last year. There are five zones.
And the work is happening only in one of the zones for now. And the zone would be ready only by 2025. Nu 7bn would be spent to complete the zone.
“Until March 2020, our progress was going so well. Our anticipated deadline was April 2021. However, after March 2020, our progress has drastically reduced to 1.7 per cent per month against our anticipated progress of 9 percent per month. To complete the remaining works we atleast need additional 300 workers by December,” said Kamal Dhakal, the Project Manager at the CDCL.
There are more than 100 skilled workers today. The Construction Development Corporation has put up a letter to the southern COVID-19 Taskforce to bring in more labourers. Currently, 50 foreign workers are in quarantine. Due to a lack of enough quarantine centres, only less number of workers is brought in at a time.
Druk Holding and Investments and Asian Development Bank are funding the project.
Sonam Penjor, Phuentshogling
Edited by Tandin Phuntsho
