Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept.2
By Azad Hasanli, Aygun Badalova - Trend:
SOCAR is currently at a transition stage and on the verge of a new period in the oil and gas industry, President of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) Rovnag Abdullayev told Trend in an interview Sept. 2.
He said that when determining SOCAR’s strategic mission, a special attention was paid to ensuring the country’s fuel and energy security, as well as the development of the oil and gas processing industry.
“Therefore, from the very beginning, the development of Azerbaijan’s oil and gas production, transportation, as well as oil and gas processing industry holds the main place in our strategic development plan,” Abdullayev said.
At the same time, he said, much work is to be done in this sphere.
He mentioned, that currently, Azerbaijan can export only low-density polyethylene. The country imports high-density polyethylene.
After completing the construction of SOCAR Polymer plant, we will turn into the exporter of high-density polyethylene, according to Abdullayev.
“As a result of the implementation of this project, the import will be decreased and the export will be increased. According to the estimations, SOCAR Polymer will bring a total of $10-$11 billion worth revenues and 30 percent of this volume is forecasted to account for the net profit,” he said.
Additionally, he said, SOCAR Polymer will directly send $1.5 billion worth various taxes to Azerbaijan’s state budget.
Aside from this project, SOCAR Carbamide, the modernization of the Heydar Aliyev Baku Oil Refinery, the construction of the huge Oil and Gas Processing and Petrochemical Complex (OGPC) is on the agenda, Abdullayev said.
He noted that great work is already underway on the most important projects.
Talking about the second stage of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field development, Abdullayev said that the project is even ahead of the schedule - around 80 percent of this project has already been completed.
Other exploration and production projects, such as “Absheron”, “Umid”, “Babek” and other projects are under development, he noted.
“New projects will give an impetus to the growth tendency of our revenues. Our annual earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) have doubled over the last seven years,” Abdullayev said.
“We direct our current revenues to investment projects. After the completion of these projects, Azerbaijan is planned to get billions of additional stable revenues,” he added.