BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 2. You (Members of Azerbaijan's national minifootball team - ed.) deserve this victory, and, in general, victories befit Azerbaijan as a whole, said President Ilham Aliyev as he received members of the Azerbaijan national team, winners of the Minifootball World Cup held in Baku, Trend reports.
Speech by President Ilham Aliyev
- Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
I'd like, first of all, to greet all our guests. Thank you for being with us today. I also express gratitude to the organizers for the continuous support of Azerbaijan's energy agenda. As was already mentioned, back in 1994, when the first oil and gas exhibition was held, right after that, Azerbaijan signed a contract with a consortium of international oil companies, later called the Contract of the Century, which actually changed the whole geopolitical and geo-economic situation in the region.
That was due to the vision of President Heydar Aliyev, who clearly understood that without broad international cooperation, especially in the field of energy, which at that time was probably the only attractive part of our economy, Azerbaijan would not be able not only to overcome difficulties, but also to become a really independent country.
Because now, when we look back at that period, we see that the road towards independence actually started from that particular historical moment. At that time, Azerbaijan was considered by foreign investors as a very risky country due to objective reasons. The country was just emerging from the civil war. The economic situation was close to collapse. Inflation was at 1,000% with overwhelming poverty, and the occupation of our territories by Armenia, which led to the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijanis, created, as you can imagine, a very dark picture for our future. Today, when we look back, we see that our energy policy was the driving force for our economic and political success.
Today, Azerbaijan is a country with a stable political system and a developing economy. The share of oil and gas in our GDP is something more than 30%. Azerbaijan is implementing large-scale economic reforms, and our economy is self-sufficient. Our foreign debt is less than 7% of GDP, and our financial reserves exceed our foreign debt by 14 times. We managed to reduce poverty due to the fair distribution of national wealth. Today, the poverty level is around 5%.
We invested largely in human capital and education, and the level of literacy is close to 100%. Then, we created a new environment in the region.
Without access to the open seas, Azerbaijan today is considered to be one of the important transportation hubs of Eurasia, with our huge investments in transportation infrastructure. Also, our energy projects have completely changed the energy map of Eurasia.
Together with our partners, we built strategic pipelines to connect the Caspian Sea with the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Of course, the crown of our pipelines is the Southern Gas Corridor, which stretches 3,500 kilometers from the Azerbaijani offshore fields to Italy.
Investing in energy security of many other countries, of course, increases the geopolitical importance of Azerbaijan. We all clearly understand that energy, oil and gas, will continue to play an important role in many countries' energy security.
When I was speaking at the Baku Energy Week last time, I informed the audience that we export natural gas to eight countries. Now I'd like to inform you that the number of countries to which we export our gas has reached 12. And this is not the end.
We are still in the process of negotiations and also making investments with some countries to expand our geography. With respect to the coverage of geography by pipeline gas, I think Azerbaijan is now one of the leading countries on a global scale.
So, all these are positive dynamics, and we see the positive impact of our energy development not only on Azerbaijan's own potential, but also on the neighborhood.
When energy resources are properly managed, and cooperation between investors, host country, transit countries, actually is as it is here, then you achieve success. So, it is a win-win situation, and we always looked very carefully at the balance of interest between producers, transit countries, and consumers. This, I think, is a very important factor for future energy cooperation.
Our natural gas export last year reached 25 billion cubic meters, and we are planning to increase our production based on the contracts already signed and on the process, which already is in the pipeline. If everything goes according to our plans, by 2030 we will increase gas exports to a level of 8 billion cubic meters. That will be available for the international market.
By that time – exactly by 2030 – we, again, based on already signed contracts and investment commitments, are planning to have 6.5 gigawatts of renewable energy installed capacity. That will be more than 35% of our total energy grid.
So, the green agenda of Azerbaijan is very ambitious. The country, which is rich in oil and gas, is investing together with foreign investors in green energy, which demonstrates our responsibility.
With all that green energy potential, we will definitely satisfy the growing needs for electricity in Azerbaijan, mainly through renewable sources, and that will save us another several billion cubic meters of gas, which will be available for export.
I can understand that as a President of COP29, maybe it's not appropriate now to talk much about oil and gas, but our agenda with respect to COP29 was very pragmatic. It was far from populism, far from false narratives. It was based on the pragmatic calculations of the countries’ demand for fossil fuels.
We see what happens in some countries when the balance between fossil fuels and green energy is not observed. It leads to blackouts and energy collapse, and it may lead to much more complicated scenarios. To keep the balance, and not to follow the trend that sometimes dictates your steps, I think, is the right policy.
So, in our case, we are increasing production of natural gas to satisfy the needs of countries, which are waiting for it, and at the same time, investing together with partners in our green energy projects.
The 8 bcm of natural gas, which we plan to have additionally by 2030, will be produced from five existing and new fields. It means that investors already operating in Azerbaijan, will increase their production. At the same time, new contracts, which have been signed or will be signed soon, will give this potential.
Last year, at Baku Energy Week, several contracts totaling 1,000 megawatts of green energy were signed. This time, several contracts of several hundred megawatts of green energy will also be signed. We are continuing on that path.
Talking about COP29, we duly consider it as a success. It was called the “Baku Breakthrough” because we managed to achieve many goals. I don't want to mention all of them, but the major achievements are the establishment of the Loss and Damage Fund, at the same time, the increase in financing for developing countries from 100 to 300 billion dollars, and also, after more than 10 years of negotiations, the carbon market became functional.
This is our legacy as a host country, as a responsible actor on the energy market, and as a country, which always puts realistic targets and is capable of bringing together different actors.
One of our roles at COP29 was to build bridges between Global South and Global North, and we managed to do it – to establish more trust between developed countries, which are the biggest polluters to the environment, and those countries, which suffer, and for them it is can existential threat.
We have a special financial package for Small Island Developing States (SIDS), which was announced at COP29, and we continue our efforts to help those needing our support.
I'd like once again to greet all our guests and wish Baku Energy Week success.
Thank you.