President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi met with British Gas Group Chief Executive Officer Helge Lund Monday to discuss the group’s plan to increase investments in Egypt, Youm7 reported.
During the meeting, Lund expressed his company’s intention to expand investments in Egypt which, according to Lund is a regional hub for oil transmission and investments especially after the recent inauguration of the New Suez Canal.
“BG group has a history of 25 years of investments in Egypt with a volume of $14 billion” Lond noted. The meeting was attended by the Minister of Petroleum Sherief Ismail.
Sisi welcomed the company’s intention, noting that Egypt has been always committed to paying up the international companies working on its land, Presidential spokesperson Alaa Youssef said. He quoted Sisi as saying that during the last two years, Egypt has paid up $3 billion debts to oil companies working in the country.
In March, BG Egypt, a subsidiary of British Gas Group, signed a tie-in agreement with BP Egypt and RWE DEA, which will increase energy supplies to Egypt’s domestic network by using BG Egypt’s infrastructure, BG announced.
Such agreements would help meet growing energy demands in Egypt, which has been witnessing a sharp energy shortage over the past four years that has caused daily power cuts, with the crisis taking a severe turn for the worse last summer.
“BG Egypt is working closely with the Government of Egypt and our partners to enable the increase of third party gas supply into the country,” BG Egypt’s President Arshad Sufi commented in previous statement.
Earlier in January, BG received a further payment equivalent to $350 million, cutting the company’s domestic receivables in Egypt to around $920 million. This was the second after October’s $350 million installment.
Egypt raised funds worth $2 billion to help provide the required finances for the repayments, to encourage foreign companies to boost exploration and production, in order to ease its energy shortage.
