Moroccan-Indian oil-prospecting cooperation probed

Head of the Moroccan oil research and exploitation office (ONAREP), Amina Belkhadra, examined in Rabat cooperation opportunities with visiting vice-president and general-manager of the Indian petroleum and natural gas firm "ONGC," respectively D.S. Porwal and S.S. Yalamarty.

An ONAREP release says the ONGC delegation also conferred with several office technicians and attended technical presentations on onshore and offshore exploration zones, legal and fiscal aspects as well as incentives in the sector.

The two sides started a technical cooperation project under which ONAREP personnel would benefit from advanced technology and methods used by the Indian firm in hydrocarbons prospecting and exploitation.

ONGC, set up in 1956, is the leading Indian firm in its sector with an output for 1999-2000 standing at 584 million tons of oil and 277 billion cubic meters of natural gas coming from fields in India, Vietnam, Kazakhstan and Iraq.