He said the cold lava flows which happened after Mount Merapi erupted in October 2010 had caused damage to 226 hectares of plantations in seven villages. The lava flows also ruined local people`s fish ponds causing an estimated Rp406 million in material losses.
"The greatest damage happened to public facilities such as bridges, dams and irrigation canals. The damage is estimated at Rp41.7 billion," he said.
However, he admitted that the material losses count was not final yet. "We still need to assess the indirect impact of the cold lava flows on the people`s economic activities," he said.
Earlier, Public Works Minister Djoko Kirmanto said the process to reconstruct and rehabilitate the Mount Merapi area was expected to be finished in two to three years.
"Currently we are making a master plan for the rehabilitation and reconstruction process," said the minister.
He said public facilities and housing complexes in the area were severely damaged by cold lava flows from the eruptions of Mount Merapi last October 2010.
"Apart from bridges and roads, several sabo-dams are also in damaged condition. We plan to gradually repair the damaged sabo-dams because we have a limited budget," said the minister.
The 2,968-meter (9,738 feet)-high Mount Merapi erupted from October 26 until November 30, 2010 leaving 350 people dead and at least 350,000 others displaced.
The volume of cold lava deposited in the upper parts of the volcano was estimated at 140 million cubic meters, whereas the capacity of the infrastructure to absorb the volcanic materials downstream was only 20 million cubic meters, according to the Public Works Ministry.
The cold lava flows made their way downward through 15 rivers (Putih, Blongkeng, Pabelan, Woro, Gendol, Boyong, Krasak, Batang, Senowo, Trising, Opak, Bebeng, Kuning, Apu dan Lamat) and from time to time overflowed the rivers` banks.
A total of 244 dams were constructed to hold the smashing cold lava flows in the 15 rivers but most of the time they did not function properly due to the huge volumes of the lava flows.
(T.A051/HAJM/A014)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
