Peruvian company Pluspetrol, a leading private exploration and production enterprise in Latin America, said investment in Iran's oil and gas sector has a promising future, a high-ranking official of Peruvian Pluspetrol said on Saturday.
Bautista Vermal, Pluspetrol's new business development manager, told IRNA, "Despite all the technical complexities in the oil industry, Iran's untapped hydrocarbon market is lucrative enough to appeal to lots of companies all over the world."
According to the expert, it was entirely predictable that Iran's Petroleum Contract Summit, in which a new framework for its oil and gas contracts was unveiled, would be welcomed by international companies as they can take advantage of unique investment opportunities in the Persian Gulf country.
Evaluating the IPC Summit as fruitful, the official noted that the conference paved the way for the establishment of close relations among Iranian domestic companies with global giants. Furthermore, officials could have arranged the participants based on their field of activity to facilitate their interaction.
Vermal believes that investors will not embark on any projects unless the sanctions imposed on Iran's banking, insurance and oil sectors become a thing of the past.
"Our company officials have shown interest in getting involved in Iran's both downstream and upstream oil and gas projects," he said.
The upstream oil sector, aka the exploration and production sector, includes searching for potential underground or underwater crude oil and natural gas fields, drilling of exploratory wells and subsequently drilling and operating the wells that recover and bring the crude oil and/or raw natural gas to the surface.
Nonetheless, the downstream sector commonly refers to the refining of crude oil and the processing of raw natural gas, as well as the marketing and distribution of products derived from crude oil and natural gas.
It is notable that exploration and production enterprises are involved in high-risk/high-reward areas of exploration and production, including finding, augmenting, producing and merchandising different types of oil and gas projects.
Pluspetrol is one of the private E&P companies in Latin America that has experienced the greatest development in the last decades. With its first operations in Argentina, the company is presently the largest oil and gas producer of Peru and one of the most important gas producers in Argentina.
With a presence in Latin America and Africa, Pluspetrol has developed its operations with the conviction that it is possible to operate in highly complex environments, using the best proven technologies, while respecting the natural environment, the local cultures and the archeological heritage of each operation.
Iran last week unveiled a new framework for its oil and gas contracts in a much-anticipated conference that brought together hundreds of domestic and international oil and gas companies in Tehran.
The Persian Gulf country also unveiled 52 projects for development and exploration of its rich hydrocarbon fields in a two-day event that drew generally positive responses from Iranian and foreign officials.
