Baku, Azerbaijan, May 7
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
The National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) is in talks with a British company to carry out oil and gas exploration projects in Iran.
NIOC official Abdolreza Asadi said negotiations are also underway with five European and Asian companies for selling them crude oil and oil products, Iran's Mehr news agency reported on May 7.
He made the remarks on the sidelines of the 19th International Oil, Gas, Refining and Petrochemical Exhibition of Iran which opened on May 6.
"So far, we held discussions with officials from Norway, Britain, Iraq, Turkey, Poland, Italy, Kazakhstan, and Sweden," he said.
The 19th International Oil, Gas, Refining and Petrochemical Exhibition of Iran opened on May 6 and runs until May 9.
Some 1800 Iranian and foreign companies from 33 countries are taking part in the exhibition.
Fields of activities will include research and development, innovation, transportation, IT, technical and engineering, exploration, and power generation.
Britain, Australia, Germany, Canada, the U.S., China, France, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Spain, the UAE, Turkey, and Malaysia, are among the participants in the exhibition.
Iran raised oil production by 65,000 barrels per day (bpd) in March from February, data compiled by Bloomberg showed.
Iran's total oil output hit 2.9 million barrels per day in March.
On April 6, Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said Iran forecasts an increase in its crude oil and natural gas production in the current Iranian calendar year.
"Iran's crude oil output is forecast to increase by about 200,000 barrels per day to 4 million barrels per day, and its daily natural gas output is forecast to increase by about 100 million cubic meters per day to 400 million cubic meters per day," the minister explained.
The country is currently exporting about 1.2 million barrels per day of oil and has earmarked 1.5 million barrels of daily sales in the national budget for the year 1393, he added.
By holding 157 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil reserves, Iran possesses the world's fourth largest reserves of crude oil.
An interim accord easing restrictions on insurance for Iran's oil shipments and freeing up cash held outside the country in return for a suspension of nuclear work went into effect in January. Under the agreement, six buyers permitted under U.S. sanctions to take Iranian crude don't have to cut imports to avoid penalties.