Major Oil & Gas International Corporations Head for Yemen [Archives:1998/22/Business & Economy]

President Ali Abdullah Saleh has given his backing to a major new industrial forum aimed at boosting the country’s rapidly developing oil and gas sector.
The inaugural Yemen Oil and Gas Conference ’98, the only event of its kind to be staged at the request of the Yemeni Government and with its official backing, will be held in Sanaa this September. It is expected to attract leading international industrialists and financiers, many for the first time.
“The official Government support will bring added benefit to sponsors, speakers and delegates,” said the Minister of Oil and Mineral Resources, Mr. Mohammed Al-Wajeeh. “It will provide a unique and much-sought-after opportunity to discuss, first-hand with Yemen’s decision makers, the opportunities coming on stream in our country.”
Yemen currently produces 385,000 barrels of oil per day, providing the country’s primary source of income.
“Perhaps more than any other event to date, this conference will identify the vast potential of Yemen’s oil and gas industry and the real business opportunities it presents to the world’s leading players in the sector with a commercial interest in emerging markets,” said Melanie Hadgraft, President, MEIDC, which is organizing the forum.
“Industrialists and project developers will get a first-hand opportunity to review the current portfolio of projects on offer and those that have long range investment potential in Yemen.”
Being totally self-sufficient in natural gas and petroleum products, the Yemeni government wants to achieve several key objectives aimed at maximizing its substantial resources for the long term fulfillment of its country’s potential.
The objectives include: addressing the domestic market’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) requirements, linking them to the country’s power generation and industrial development initiatives and the consolidation and expansion of its LNG export market potential through the Yemen LNG Company, a consortium of Total, Yemen Gas Company, Hunt, Exxon, Yukong and Hyundai.
The Yemen LNG project aims to export early into the next century an LNG production of approximately 5.3 million tons per year.
The recent decision by the Yemeni cabinet to privatize the state-owned Aden oil refinery, in a bid to secure financing to upgrade it, is also viewed as another major step in the state’s privatization drive.
Other future projects include building a new private power plant in Aden, new refineries in Hodeida and Hadhramaut as well as increasing storage facilities .
The Yemen Oil and Gas Conference will address the entire range of industrial requirements from surveying to exploration and production.
The conference will also cover the country’s substantial finance and investment requirements to implement mainstream infrastructure project development, with the ultimate aim of building long-term, mutually beneficial working relationships between the Yemeni government and the international oil and gas investment community.
The Yemen Oil and Gas Conference is the latest in a series of high powered government-led forums staged by the Dubai-based MEIDC, which has a world renowned event portfolio including the powerful Middle East Infrastructure Development Congress held annually in the UAE and the internationally-acclaimed Gas Utilization for Power and the Industrial Development Forum held in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia, with the support of three Saudi ministers and the Royal Commission.
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