Jakarta Emergency Dredging Initiative

"The Jakarta Emergency Dredging Initiative (JEDI) Project aims to reduce the risk of frequent flooding to the city of Jakarta by rehabilitating existing waterways and retention basins (waduk) and restoring their capacity to accommodate the original design flows. The project will concentrate on 18 selected sections of rivers, large drains and retention basins of Jakarta. These drainage sections include drains and floodways under Ministry of Public Work authority, and major drains and retention basin under DKI Jakarta authority.

The main activities within the project will be the dredging of waterways and retention basins–including transport, processing, treatment (if needed) and disposal of the dredged material–as well as the rehabilitation of waterway and retention basin infrastructure (e.g., embankments, pumps). The project also includes capacity building activities for [Government of Indonesia] implementing partners to support the development of feasible monitoring, management and maintenance plans to ensure that the discharge capacity, once increased, is sustained.

The project is being prepared and will be implemented in two distinct phases; priority is given to those the dredging rivers and drains that have relatively minor social and not significant environmental impacts. Accordingly, the detailed design and contract documents, as well as the associated environmental and social assessments will also be carried out in two phases.

The scope of work for the consultancy firm is to assist the Project Management Unit of JEDI Project to produce the Phase 1 EIA. The Phase 1 work covers six dredging sites and one disposal site. Of the 18 dredging sites covered in the JEDI project, these Phase 1 sites have been identified and agreed to involve minimal to no social and environmental (i.e. sediment quality ) impact issues and therefore afford the opportunity to experiment with different dredging and transport options." (source)

The primary objectives of the Jakarta Emergency Dredging Initiative (JEDI) are to:
• alleviate the impacts of annual floods in DKI Jakarta through the priority rehabilitation and dredging of existing floodways, drains and retention basins, in accordance with international best practices; and
• provide technical expertise through on-the-job training to strengthen the capacity of DKI Jakarta and MoPW to operate and maintain its flood control system, in accordance with international standards.

The project is intended to reduce the economic and social cost of flooding by partially restoring the capacity of the city’s flood control system to its original design level.  The emergency nature of the World Bank’s and GoI's response presents an opportunity to capture a window of national, political unity to address a problem that, every year, affects millions of urban dwellers.

-Andrew Trabulsi