Russian President Vladimir Putin tried to lure the heads of Anglo-Dutch group Shell, US major ConocoPhillips, British Petroleum and Italy’s ENI to boost foreign investment to develop Russia’s untapped resources while urging them to grant Russian companies access to international assets.
At the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russia's annual economic showcase, Putin, who is now back at the Kremlin, tried to convince US and European oil and gas giants that Russia is one of the most welcoming countries for energy investments.
Putin is trying to improve Russia’s investment image after BP, which owns half of Russia’s third-largest oil producer, announced that it is seeking a buyer for the stake amid tensions with its billionaire partners in joint venture TNK-BP. The biggest foreign energy investment in Russia, TNK-BP accounts for about a quarter of BP’s output.
“[But] the fact that BP is planning to leave Russia is not set in stone,” Moscow-based oil & gas analyst at Alfa Bank Maria Yegikyan told New Europe on 22 June, referring to press reports on 21 June, which cited sources close to government as saying that BP is considering taking part in Rosneft’s privatisation. “BP leaving TNK-BP doesn't signal to a worsening of the investment climate in Russia, but is rather a consequence of the long-term dispute with AAR. BP's participation in Rosneft's privatisation would show the company's confidence in Rosneft's growth potential and stability in Russia, which would improve general sentiment towards Russia and become a major growth trigger for Rosneft itself.”
On 21 June, Igor Sechin, the head of state-run oil producer Rosneft and Putin’s former deputy prime minister for energy, signed agreements with Norway's Statoil Chief Executive Helge Lund and ENI CEO Paolo Scaroni to form joint ventures to explore Russia's Arctic offshore zones. The deals also grant the Russian state firm access to their projects in other countries. Statoil will get the right to help develop five fields with resources in the Stavropol region of southern Russia, Sechin said.
The companies also agreed in May to co-operate in the region and West Siberia, as well as four blocks in Russia’s part of the Barents Sea and in the Sea of Okhotsk, as well as in Norway’s offshore.
Rosneft will grant ENI access to resources in the Arctic offshore and Black Sea, in exchange for stakes in refining and North African production assets, Sechin told reporters after the signing.
Rosneft has formed alliances with Exxon Mobil, ENI and Statoil this year that grant access to potentially billions of barrels of offshore and hard-to-recover resources in exchange for stakes in projects abroad.
Putin singled out Shell, which has been in talks with Russian gas monopoly Gazprom about international deals, praising the company on its joint ventures within Russia and saying he supports their expansion.
Yegikyan reminded that the deals signed on 21 June between Rosneft and the foreign oil majors are nothing new because the agreements were announced previously and “that the accords signed formalise earlier announced agreements and are simply the next step towards their realisation. The only novelty here was specifying what Rosneft would be getting in exchange for the rights to co-operate in Russia’s Arctic projects”.
KGeropoulos@NEurope.eu
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