ONGC

Exxon Mobil Corp, Shell, Total and Russia's OAO Lukoil
are vying for the right to develop 10 fields holding 41
billion barrels of oil reserves, a third of the country’s
total deposits, on offer in the round taking place in Baghdad
today and tomorrow.

Iraq, holder of the world's third-largest oil reserve, is
seeking foreign investors to boost output after six years of
conflict, and prior sanctions destroyed its infrastructure.
Iraq wants to boost oil output to 7 million barrels a day
in the next six years, its Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani
said in a speech at the round today.
The 10 projects available in the second round are
Majnoon, West Qurna-2, Najmah, Qaiyarah, East Baghdad, the
Eastern Fields, Badra, Middle Furat, Halfaya and Garraf, with
five sites offered on each of the two days.
Bidders must accept service contracts that pay them a
flat fee for each barrel extracted, rather than production-
sharing agreements in which they gain a stake in the crude
produced. A service contract means that they do not benefit
from a rise in oil prices.
In the first licensing round, BP Plc and CNPC won the
contract for the southern Rumaila field, the biggest offered.
None of the other seven projects was awarded in June as
the ministry failed to agree with companies on the amount they
would be paid for extracting oil and gas. Subsequently,
contracts were agreed with Irving, Texas-based Exxon and Eni,
based in Rome. PTI ANZ
DDC



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