Tehran, Iran, June 2
By Mehdi Sepahvand - Trend:
The Iranian Ministry of Industry, Mining, and Trade has drafted a maritime industries strategy.
Announcing the news, Minister Mohammad Reza Nematzadeh said the plan is going to be presented to the Supreme Council of Maritime Industries next week, Fars news agency reported June 2.
He said the plan would be unveiled in the near future. "This document shows us a 10-year perspective, telling us what to do in the meantime," he added.
Nematzadeh made the statements on the sidelines of a business convention to sign contracts for constructing five offshore drilling rigs in the Persian Gulf.
He noted that in the past few years, Iran has signed similar, but smaller, contracts to be carried out at the Caspian Sea but it is the first time such contracts are signed on Gulf projects.
The country is estimated to be in need of about 15 offshore drilling rigs. A new group can start with building three to five rigs, he noted.
Each rig costs about $200 million, but Iranian contractors will carry out the projects possibly for less than that.
Nematzadeh said the ministry is concerned why so far the government used to have Chinese companies build the rigs it needed.
Heidar Bahmani, Director of National Iranian Drilling Company (NIDC), said last November that the oil and gas wells drilling industry has been indigenized in Iran.
This is while Mohammad-Reza Takaidi, deputy director of NIDC, said on September 15, 2014 that 100 percent of the drilling rigs that have been imported to Iran over the past seven to eight years had been Chinese-made.
Edited by CN