Russian Firms provide One-Sixth of Egypt’s Strategic Oil Reserves

The Russian firms working in Egyptian petroleum sector are providing one-sixth of Egypt’s oil strategic reserves, an official source in Egyptian oil ministry said on Wednesday.

The source further expected that Egypt would witness a greater contribution by the Russian firms in the upcoming period, saying Moscow had earlier announced its participation in the Egyptian March Economic Summit. Such participation in the Egyptian summit would result in seeing Russia winning new concession areas in Egypt’s petroleum sector, the source elaborated.

Speaking to Amwal Al Ghad on Wednesday, the source referred to ongoing negotiations between Cairo and Moscow over the latter’s investments related to the 12 refining, petrochemicals and mining projects, which will be presented in the Egypt’s Economic Summit in March.

The source further affirmed that Russian investments in Egypt would increase after the two parties had agreed to use their national currencies in bilateral trade instead of US Dollar.

Moreover, the source noted that Egypt’s petroleum sector would enter talks with Gazprom over obtaining new concession areas and investment opportunities to explore oil and natural gas by the Russian firm within the coming period. In addition, Egypt will cooperate with Gazprom in the field of importing liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Gazprom is a global energy company. Its major business lines are geological exploration, production, transportation, storage, processing and sales of gas, gas condensate and oil, sales of gas as a vehicle fuel as well as generation and marketing of heat and electric power.