No more limitation on gas supply to domestic companies: Minister

The gas supplies to the industries within the country will not be regulated any more. This will be stipulated in the national gas master plan to maintain a balance between the production volume and both the domestic and foreign market demands, the Media Indonesia newspaper reported in its Tuesday edition.

?Most probably, there will be a change in the Oil and Gas Law No. 22/2001. Mapping of national gas master plan will be completed in 2006, after the study to revise the law was conducted. Later, there will not be any limits on the consumption of gas by local industries,? Minister of Trade Fahmi Idris said in Jakarta on Monday.

This effort, according to Fahmi, is based on the perception that the national gas must be utilized for the development of domestic industries. So far, most of the gas has been exported to foreign countries and it has been helping the industries of other countries to grow.

?It is in this context, all these matters must be reviewed,? he said.

This policy concept, the minister said, was already intensively discussed by the senior officials of the Ministry of Industry, Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources and the Office of the State Minister of State Enterprises.

Fahmi added that oil and gas law became a stumbling block to allocate gas for the domestic industries as it stipulated that gas producers were obliged to allocate a maximum of 25 percent of their output to the domestic industries. (*)