Workshop attracting investment funds to be held in Kalgoorlie

7/4/97

A workshop aimed at attracting investment funds to proposed major development projects in the Goldfields-Esperance region will be held in Kalgoorlie today.

Federal Parliamentary Secretary for Transport and Regional Development, Michael Ronaldson, and Western Australian Regional Development Minister Hendy Cowan said the workshop was part of a new national program to build bridges between regional development project proponents and major institutional investors.

They said the Institutional Investor Information Service (IIIS) was launched jointly by the Commonwealth and States last December to address concerns that major regional projects were missing out on finance because institutional investors did not understand them or investigate the investment opportunities they presented.

The service aimed to fill an information gap and help inject significant new funds into regional development.

Mr Cowan said WA had the added disadvantage of being a long way from the main investor centres in Sydney and Melbourne.

Projects include infrastructure developments such as water and power supplies as well as transport and services.

Representatives of major national institutional investors as well as Commonwealth and West Australian Governments will help to conduct workshops at Bunbury, Perth, Kalgoorlie and Geraldton this week.

Leading local businesspeople including accountants, bankers, stockbrokers, lawyers, superannuation fund managers as well as representatives of local, State and Commonwealth Government agencies will also attend.

The workshops are being conducted jointly by the Australian Council for Infrastructure Development (AusCID), the Western Australian Department of Commerce and Trade and regional Development Commissions .

Goldfields-Esperance Development Commission Director Rob Walster, who will chair the Kalgoorlie workshop, said he welcomed the initiative which could help to expand mining activity and improve services in the region.

The workshops will each focus on three local region development projects. In Kalgoorlie these are the Goldfields-Esperance saline water pipeline, a Kalgoorlie-Boulder wastewater treatment plant and the Kalgoorlie-Boulder transport hub.

The projects will be analysed so that investors fully understand them, while proponents will learn about investor needs when assessing investment opportunities.

About 100 projects are being targeted for the State register.

The Kalgoorlie workshop will be held at the Railway Motel, Forrest Street, 1.30 pm - 5 pm.

Media contact: Peter Jackson 222 9595