• Project for the Construction of the Telephone Outside Plant Maintenance Model Center (Grant Aid) (1985)
• Telephone Outside Plant Maintenance Training Center (Project-Type Technical Cooperation) (1986)
• Telephone Outside Plant Construction Center (Project-Type Technical Cooperation) (1994)

Period:

• Project for the Construction of the Telephone Outside Plant Maintenance Model Center (Date of Exchange of Notes (E/N): July 26, 1985)
• Telephone Outside Plant Maintenance Training Center (April 1, 1986 to March 31, 1995)
• Telephone Outside Plant Construction Center (November 20, 1994 to November 19, 1998)

Place:
    Bandung, West Java Province

Amount Provided:
    557 million yen (Grant Aid)

Purpose:
Telephone Outside Plant Maintenance Training Center (hereinafter refer to “OPMC”) had established with the purpose for developing human resources for conducting telephone line maintenance activities with urgent demand. At the time, the Government of Indonesia had decided to expand and install much telephone line in cooperation with foreign country financial assistance due to Indonesia was late behind from other ASEAN countries with telephone density.

Telephone Outside Plant Construction Center (hereinafter refer to “OPCC”) had established with the purpose for developing human resources for supervising personnel of TELKOM (Public Telephone Corporation in Indonesia) on telephone line construction with the knowledge of construction method, construction supervision and inspection.

Outline:
Though the Republic of Indonesia was making a steady economical growth at that time, a lack of good telecommunication networks, poor telephone conditions in particular, was an impediment for the country to make further progress. The telephone density of Indonesia in December 1988 was 0.47 per 100 persons and at the end of the fiscal year 1993 was a mere 0.8 set per 100 persons, the lowest level among the ASEAN countries. Therefore, the Indonesian government, through PURMTEL (Public Telephone Corporation in Indonesia which become TELKOM later on), was planning to expand telephone network by five million in a five-year plan beginning 1994.

The main reason of poor telephone density at the time was mainly the delay of telephone subscriber line construction. But the sharp increase of telephone subscriber line construction had caused another problem which PULMTEL should be solved urgently in the productivity and efficiency improvement point of view at the same time.

Although new telephone exchange and telephone lines for the expansion of telephone subscriber line were installed during this time, the rate of breakdown in telephone network was very high (4.1 instances per month per 100 sets, (0.2 instances in Japan)) which made the rate of breakdown higher at the line part, caused by a lack of ability in telephone line construction. As far as telephone line construction in Indonesia was concerned, a standard in designing, construction method, equipment and materials used was not in place. The problem also lied in a lack of proper inspection due to a poor construction supervising ability.

Therefore, the Japanese government, through those projects cooperated with Indonesia, (1) human resource development for telephone line maintenance by setting up of OPMC and, (2) setting up a standard of the construction by TELKOM and making a training program to standardize line construction and develop construction supervisors for the purpose of “improving construction management of telephone line construction works,” by establishing OPCC which the Indonesian government had requested. Through those training programs, Instructors were developed and a training course for construction supervisors was set up at OPCC. Since after 1994, OPCC has been accepting about 100 or more trainees each year and now the on site training facility built under the project has been managed and used properly with teaching material renewed as well as new material concerning optical fiber and the like being prepared.

TELKOM employee trainee inspecting switching equipment	TELKOM employee trainee inspecting a telephone line laid underground