Total to lower investment to $1.1b in Mahakam block next year

By Febry Silaban

French firm Total SA, through its unit Total EP Indonesie (TEPI), is planning to reduce its investment in the Mahakam block, East Kalimantan, next year due to lingering drop in oil and gas prices, according to a top official of the firm.

"I can not explain the details of the reduction. But the trend of disinvestment is indeed plural happen to all companies throughout the world," Director of Total EP Asia Pacific, Olivier Cleret de Langavant said in Jakarta recently.

Arividya Noviyanto, Vice President for Human Resources, Communications, and General Services at TEPI said to Petromindo.com that the company will only allocate US$1.1 billion for investment in the Mahakam block in 2016. This is 42 percent lower compared with the $1.9 billion investment allocated for 2015.

"As said by SKK Migas? Head (Amien Sunaryadi), the decline in investment in the Mahakam block is not because of the expiration of the block (contract) in 2017, but due to the condition of oil and gas prices. Under these conditions we do not run a lot of programs," he said, referring to the upstream oil and gas authority.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak