Companies earmark $26.2b for investment this year

A total of 274 upstream oil and gas companies here are poised to spend US$26.2 billion for exploration and production activities this year, according to the approved 2013 Work Program and Budget (WP&B) released by upstream authority SK Migas.

?The WP&B totals $26.2 billion, considerably higher than investment in 2012 which amounted to $21.88 billion,? said SK Migas Chairman/Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Jero Wacik in a media statement made available on Tuesday.

The figure includes $2.7 billion in exploration activities, namely to drill 75 conventional oil and gas wells, as well as 82 CBM wells. ?We expect the PSC holders to execute the approved program and budget so that production and revenue targets can be achieved.?

Wacik also added that that SK Migas encourages a greater use of local contents in the activities so that the spent money could bring even bigger multiplier effects to the national economy, not only in term of revenue but also in term of domestic capacity empowerment.

SK Migas Deputy Chairman on Planning Widhyawan Prawiraatmadja added that the WP&B approval shows that the authority reacted well to industry demand despite the recent dissolvement of BPMIGAS.

Editing by Dadan Wijaksana