Daqing oil field in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province said on Monday its pre-tax profits for 2005 topped 100 billion yuan (about US$12 billion ).

 

Daqing thus became the country's top taxpayer for the fifth straight year.

 

Its crude oil output reached 44.95 million tons, the most among all Chinese oil fields, which brought the accumulated output to 1.86 billion tons by the end of last year, making up over 40 percent of China's total, the oil field administration said in a statement.

 

Last year, Daqing also produced more than 2.4 billion cubic meters of natural gas, it said.

 

Newly-found oil deposits reached an all-time high of more than 100 million tons and ascertained gas deposits topped 100 billion cubic meters, which it said "would help improve the overall distribution of China's natural gas resources."

 

A blueprint of Daqing indicated the oil field would work to maintain an equivalent of more than 42 million tons in annual oil and gas output from 2006 to 2010, and at least 40 million tons before 2020.

 

(Xinhua News Agency January 10, 2006)