Foreign investment attraction key to modernisation of PetroVietnam

In the past, the firm only signed contracts with foreign contractors on behalf of the Government and performed the role of managing their activities. PetroVietnam now boasts a full capacity of technologies to engage in oil and gas exploration and exploitation activities inside the country and abroad. This ability matches PetroVietnam with national oil and gas groups of other countries in the region.

Currently, more than 40 foreign oil and gas companies are investing in Vietnam in upstream, midstream and downstream. Chevron from the US leads the way in investment in Vietnam, along with KNOC from the Republic of Korea, Gazprom from Russia, Petronas from Malaysia, PTTEP from Thailand, Talisman and Repsol from Spain, ExxonMobil from the US, and Total and Neon Energy from France.

The majority of the companies invest in capital contribution with Vietnamese enterprises to perform oil contracts. In addition, Vietnam also signed a cooperation agreement with Russia to establish joint ventures which are tasked to conduct oil exploration in Russia and Vietnam. Thank to the cooperation activities, so far, 38 oil and gas fields out of a total of more than 100 oil and gas discoveries have been put into operation.

In the period, Vietnam saw an increase in its reserve by 35-40 million tonnes of oil equivalent per year. The average production output hit 15.5 - 17 million tonnes of oil and over 9 billion cu.m of gas per year. As a result, in the period before 2015, the oil and gas industry annually contributed 20-25% of the total State budget collection and 18-25% of the country's GDP.

Growing fast

Thanks to its collaboration with foreign partners, PetroVietnam has accessed many advanced technologies, picking up modern and integrated management methods.

According to the Vietnam Oil and Gas Association, partnership with foreign contractors in the upstream stage of oil and gas exploration and exploitation has contributed to the formation of a series of large projects in the midstream and downstream of the petroleum industry. These include gas processing plants, gas thermal power plants, petrochemical refineries and nitrogenous fertilizer plants. These have been put into operation and contributed to the development of the country’s economic development, national industrialisation and modernisation.

Specifically, the oil and gas sector has successfully implemented three national key project clusters/ projects, namely Ca Mau Gas - Electricity – Fertilizer Project Cluster; Dong Nam Bo Gas - Electricity - Fertilizer Project Cluster and Dung Quat Oil Refinery Project. These projects are effective not only economically but also greatly contributing to the socio-economic development of the country as a whole and that of the localities where the project are located.

Supply chains of oil and gas technical services for exploration and production activities have also developed strongly. Many member companies of the PetroVietnam such as PTSC, PV Drilling, PVEP, PVE have provided petroleum technical services for oil and gas activities not only inside the country but also in the region and around the world.

PetroVietnam member companies have mastered new technologies and are able to participate in and provide most of the high-quality oil and gas services when called upon. These include seismic surveying, drilling, drilling services, design survey, construction and installation of oil and gas works, and repairing and building new oil and gas floating storage facilities.

Every year, income from oil and gas technical services contributes nearly 30% of the group's total revenue, and accounts for 10% of its State budget payment.