The Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El-Molla, said on Wednesday that the total production of the Western Desert region currently represents about 60% of Egypt's crude oil production. El-Molla's statements followed the general assembly of the Agiba Petroleum Company, which he chaired, to adopt the planning budget for the fiscal year 2019/20. He explained that the recent discoveries in the Western Desert confirm that this region is not yet fully employed, and called for foreign oil companies to intensify their exploration efforts. Furthermore, El-Molla explained that the coming period will witness a great growth in production, as a result of the rapid development of new discoveries, linking them to pipeline networks and processing plants, as well as a decrease in the cost of production, and high-quality crude oil to be produced. Agiba's Chairperson Essam Qaffas stated, “The company plans to produce about 46,000 barrels of crude oil per day and about 19m cubic feet of gas per day during the next financial year, which will witness extensive activity by drilling 55 wells and carrying out 250 wells' maintenance operations.” He stressed that work is currently being carried out to complete the implementation of the plan in order to increase production, raising the output of the Ashrafi Oil Field to 3,500 barrels of oil per day, after the completion of the maintenance of three wells in the field, and is planning the maintenance of four other wells. Regarding the Meleha Field, Qaffas said that the company succeeded in starting to generate output from the ‘Falak 21' well, with a daily production of 250 barrels of crude oil, in addition to generating about 1,000 barrels per day from the ‘Yasmine 3' well.
