Taxila: The government has leased out 10 out of 40 blocks identified for oil and gas exploration, a news source quoted Federal Minister for Petroleum Ghulam Sarwar Khan. He said the government would also reconstitute all boards of directors of oil and gas companies in the next 100 days.
The announcement comes days after Pakistan Petroleum Limited (PPL) discovered back-to-back gas reserves at its exploratory wells Hadaf X-1 (ST) and Benari X-1 (ST-2) in Sindh.
Talking about Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline project, Khan said that construction work on the project was in its advanced stages.
The project would be completed in two phases; funds for Phase I would be secured using long-term debts sourced from a mixture of multilateral development agencies, export credit agencies, and commercial banks.
Turkmenistan is pushing for the project’s inauguration in March 2019. TAPI Pipeline Company Ltd CEO Muhammetmyrat Amanov said heads of states of all four member countries should be requested to attend the inauguration ceremony.
