ECRL to raise east coast contribution

KUALA LUMPUR: The East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) is expected to raise the contribution of the east coast region to the Gross Domestic Product by 1.5 percent, the Dewan Rakyat was told yesterday.

Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Othman Aziz said the project was also expected to explore sources of non-operating income such as advertising, retail and so on to cover the repayment of loans taken to meet the cost of implementation.

“ECRL is expected to earn revenue through passenger fares, payment for cargo services and non-fare earnings.

“We expect the project to bring in revenue from 2024, with a projected income of RM2.9 billion,” he said when replying to a question from Datuk Dr Ewon Ebin (BN-Ranau) who had wanted to know the national income projection from the implementation of the ECRL and whether such income was sufficient to repay the project financing loan.

Othman said the government also projected that from 2032, the company operating the ECRL would be able to run independently without injection of funds from the government.

He said the repayment of the project cost, which involved 85 percent financing through a soft loan from Exim Bank and 15 percent funded by the provision of a ‘sukuk’ or bond programme by local financial institutions, would begin in 2024 after completion of the implementation. - Bernama