The law determines that the state-owned DARS will wholly take over financing, while the state will retain a strategic role by determining which road sections will be built and when and by handling spatial planning.
DARS will effectively become a concessionaire which will assume all financial obligations related to the construction of new motorway sections, which means it will have to sign a concession agreement with the state.
However, the act also allows for the possibility that the concession agreement is signed with other concessionaires and regulates the transfer of financing of motorway construction and maintenance to the private sector.
The main source of financing will be DARS's revenues and loans hired by the company in its own name.
Along with the new DARS law the parliament confirmed a state guarantee act for a EUR 297.8m loan that DARS will take out, the last such guarantee act involving DARS.
Motorway construction in Slovenia is almost completed as the entire network bar some small sections has been completed.
However, DARS is expected to play a leading role in the construction of several expressways planned to link more remote regions of the country to the national motorway network.
