Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Wealth Sherif Ismail said on Tuesday that Egypt has outlined a strategy for the development of the petroleum, energy sector as well as exploration within the coming three years.
In statements on the fringe of the second day of a conference for the American Chamber of Commerce and the Egyptian-American Business Council which groups 68 American investors, the minister said gas sector investments reached dlrs 23 billion, while the petrochemicals investments hit dlrs 6.2 billion.
The minister reiterated that the government is currently conducting studies on carrying out a number of national and development projects that will tap new investment domains and propel the economic growth rates.
He said the oil sector is suffering a gap between supply and demand as a result of fixing rates of oil production and the decrease in gas production rates as well as not signing new oil agreements from 2011 till 2013 besides other problems in the oil production facilities.
He also said some 36 new agreements have been signed since February 2013 with total investments estimated at dlrs 2 billion with the aim of drilling some 153 oil wells.
Other 20 agreements are currently being prepared with investments worth dlrs 10 billion besides the implementation of gas production at a total investment up to dlrs 12 billion.
Source: MENA