Petrobangla officials are assuming that foreign companies might have taken the current political situation into consideration. And Foreign companies are closing their hands from Bangladesh and it is leading foreign investment-less in Bangladesh in near future.
Tender for offshore oil and gas exploration in the Bay of Bengal was floated on 10 March with a six-month period and the interim government in September extended the deadline by three months to 9 December.
No gas or oil has been discovered since Bangladesh won the dispute over maritime boundary for more than a decade. Four foreign companies started working, but three of them abandoned work before their deadline. The remaining one might leave in February next.
According to sources at the Petrobangla, US-based multinational gas and oil companies ExxonMobil Corporation and Chevron Corporation, Malaysia’s PETRONAS Chemicals Group, Norwegian-France joint venture TGS-Schlumberger, Japanese firm Inpex Corporation and Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC), China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), Singapore-based KrisEnergy, India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Crude have shown interest at various times and have contacted Petrobangla. Of them, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Inpex and JOGMEC purchased data on multidimensional surveys, but none of them participated in tenders. It is actually sheer distressing that Foreign investment is going to zero if this political turmoil in Bangladesh going on.
The government introduced the Production Sharing Contract (PSC) to attract foreign companies, fixing the gas price at 10 per cent of the oil price. Gas prices will fluctuate along with oil prices. Currently, the oil price is USD 70-72, thus, the gas price will be USD 7-7.2 per cent. Oil price was at over USD 90 per cent when tenders were floated.
According to Petrobangla chairman Zanendra Nath Sarker ‘none participated in the tender. They didn’t inform them about reasons. He said they would contact these companies and evaluate the documents. After that, preparation on tender will be taken again after carrying out necessary amendments.’