TEHRAN- Upstream oil and gas sectors require $100 billion of investment to meet the objectives of the country’s Sixth National Development Plan (2016-2021), Abdolmohammad Delparish, the deputy managing director of National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) for corporate planning, said in a press conference in Tehran on Saturday.

The official also said that progress of the sixth plan is conditioned on materializing the objectives of developing oil industry.

“As you know, one of the main objectives of the sixth development plan is to achieve economic growth of eight percent, and based on this target, the Oil Ministry is planned to reach a nine-percent growth. Among all subsidiaries of the ministry, NIOC is in charge of the major part of responsibilities to meet the growth objective,” Delparish stated.

The official further notified that the daily productions of oil, gas and gas condensate are projected to reach 4.5 million barrels, 1.3 billion cubic meters and 950,000 barrels respectively, according to the sixth development plan.

He went on to mention some of the programs of NIOC to achieve objectives of the sixth plan as completing all first development phases of West Karoun oil fields (five oilfields in the western part of Iran’s southwestern region of Karoun, straddling borders with Iraq), and also South Pars gas field (which Iran shares with Qatar in the Persian Gulf), and starting the second phases of development as well as making definite decision on all other joint fields of the country.

Saying that for the moment about 30 million cubic meters of flare gases are burnt each day in the country, the official pointed to recovery of flare gases as one of the other programs of his company regarding the sixth plan.

He also announced that 130 drilling rigs will be applied by NIOC in the discovery and production projects during the sixth development plan.

NIOC has planned to implement 30-35 development projects on average in each year of the sixth plan, Delparish further announced.

‘2 or 3 deals to be signed based on IPC by Mar. 2017’

Addressing the same conference, Gholamreza Manouchehri, the deputy managing director of NIOC for development and engineering affairs, said that Iran will sign two or three deals based on the new model of oil contracts, known as IPC, by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2017).

IPC, which will replace buy-back contracts, is expected to offer more flexible terms on oil price fluctuations and investment risks to make the sector more financially attractive.

Manouchehri expressed hope that the modified draft of IPC will be approved by the cabinet in this week and then it will be sent to the Majlis.

 ‘South Pars drilling, platform & refinery building by Iranians’

Ali-Akbar Sha’banpour, the managing director of Pars Oil and Gas Company which is the operator of implementing development phases of South Pars gas field, for his part said that all projects related to drilling, platform building and construction of refineries in Pars Special Economic Energy Zone (PSEEZ) have been conducted wholly by the Iranian expertise and manpower.

Construction of refineries will be finished by the end of the next Iranian calendar year (March 2018), the official announced.

He said, “We have also achieved high technology for the power plant section of the South Pars projects.”

While emphasizing the necessity of applying modern technology in development of joint fields, the official said that the oil industry requires investment and technology for preserving its share of South Pars and other joint fields.