Project

Berovo Urban Water Supply and Sanitation Project

EBP is responsible for the technical and institutional support and know-how transfer in the rehabilitation and extension of Berovo's regional water supply infrastructure and the implementation of a waste water collector and treatment system.

In this demanding project, EBP improves and extends the water supply and waste water infrastructure in Berovo, Macedonia, and transfers organisational and institutional know-how to the public authorities.

The Swiss government pursues a long-term involvement in the cooperation with Central and Eastern Europe and focuses on several countries in the region, among others Macedonia. Within this framework, focus has been laid on Macedonia's water sector for many years and thus, great experience has been built up. SECO (Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs) intends to establish a River Basin Management in the Bregalnica catchments' area, one of the main water resources in the eastern part of Macedonia. In a first step, the quality of the upstream part of the River Bregalnica will be improved by installing and upgrading the water supply infrastructure and the waste water treatment systems of Berovo, a municipality of about 10'000 inhabitants.

SECO has mandated EBP to implement this demanding project which consists of two main aspects:

(1) technical and (2) institutional support and know-how transfer in the rehabilitation and extension of Berovo's regional water supply infrastructure and the implementation of a waste water collector and treatment system.

As main consultant, EBP is responsible for the design and the overall supervision of the construction works. The beneficiary of the project is the public utility Usluga whom we provide technical assistance during the implementation phase as well as institutional and financial enhancement.

The technical project component consists on one side of the renovation of the existing water supply network and the construction of a new reservoir in order to provide reliable and safe drinking water for the population. On the other side, a new main collector and a subsequent waste water treatment plant (14'000 PE) is built to prevent the pollution of the river Bregalnica. Improved environmental conditions allow a better development of the local economy, tourism and food processing industry.

The measures of the institutional support improve the operational efficiency of Usluga, e.g. it covers the implementation of business planning and new computerized financial management system, and provides the corresponding training of the staff.

EBP implements the project with two main partners. As local sub-consultant the Skopje-based Environ supports the project with design, local tendering supervision of the implementation. The Swiss consultancy company Gebrüder Hunziker Ltd provides backstopping for the waste water treatment design.

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