Eric Watkins
Senior Correspondent
LOS ANGELES, Apr. 3 -- Indonesia's state-owned PT Pertamina aims to increase production of crude oil and natural gas in 2008, despite falling short of planned output in both areas during 2007.
Pertamina Pres. Director Ari H. Soemarno told a parliamentary oversight committee that the firm would produce some 65.72 million bbl of crude oil in 2008, about 25.73% more than the 52.27 million bbl produced in 2007, which fell 8% short of the 56.57 million bbl targeted for the year.
Pertamina also failed to achieve its 2007 gas production target of 519.68 bscf, producing 405.71 bscf, around 22% less than expected. For 2008, Pertamina has set a gas production target of 438.05 bscf, about 16% lower than planned for 2007.
Ari was nonetheless upbeat about the Pertamina's performance in 2007. He told the committee that the firm's oil production was 9.53% higher than the 47.72 million bbl produced in 2006, while its gas production was 8.6% higher than 2006's 373.57 bscf.
Despite failing to reach its oil and gas production targets last year, Ari said, Pertamina booked a 28.4% rise in net profit to 24.4 trillion rupiahs in 2007—up from 19 trillion rupiahs in 2006—due to increases in oil prices on the world market.
According to Pertamina's unaudited financial reports, he said, the company had total revenue of 393.6 trillion rupiahs in 2007 against 369.2 trillion rupiahs in total expenditure.
Contact Eric Watkins at [email protected].
