State oil companies from China, the world's second-largest oil
importer, and fifth-largest exporter Venezuela are strengthening
their partnership by co-investing in oilfields in the South
American country.
China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the parent company of the
nation's largest oil producer listed in Hong Kong, PetroChina, on
Thursday signed an initial agreement with Venezuela's state oil
company, Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA), to develop and manage
Venezuela's Zumano oilfields in the eastern part of the country,
PDVSA said in a statement on its website.
Liu Weijiang, a CNPC spokesman, on Friday told China Daily the
two companies signed an agreement this week during the recent visit
to China by Venezuelan Minister of Energy and Petroleum and PDVSA
President Rafael Ramrez.
Liu did not elaborate on the content of the agreements, saying
CNPC would remain low-key before any concrete progress has been
made.
In order to expand business in China, PDVSA set up a branch
office in Beijing on Monday.
The Zumano area has 400 million barrels of light and medium
crude and 4 billion cubic feet of gas reserves, said PDVSA.
"We want China to take part as an investor and a partner," said
Ramrez during his China tour.
Venezuela plans to spend US$56 billion from 2006 to 2012 to
double its oil production to 5.1 million barrels a day from the
current 2.6 million barrels per day.
China last year produced some 1.27 billion barrels of oil, and
imported 898 million barrels.
Venezuela said last week that it expects to export 300,000
barrels of crude a day to China by 2012 from the current level of
68,800 barrels a day.
The South American country hopes to supply 15 to 20 per cent of
China's oil import needs, PDVSA said in the statement.
The two companies are studying a possible refinery project in
China, PDVSA said.
They have also held preliminary discussions about creating a
financing fund for building infrastructure in Venezuela based on
oil trade, PDVSA said. Further details were not available from
either of the two companies.
(China Daily August 27, 2005)