Yemen awards exploration contract to Yemeni-British company

Yemen has signed a $ 20 million memorandum of understanding with a joint Yemeni-British company to search for oil in the Arab country.
Rasheed Baraba, deputy minister of oil and mineral resources, said the Oil and Gas Mine Company (OGMC) would carry out exploration in two sectors in Yemen during six years of exploration work divided into two periods.
"Explorations would take place in Sector 31 south of Belhaf in the Shabwa governorate and in sector 41 west of the town of Mukalla in the Hadramout governorate,'' Baraba said.
He said OGMC is a British company owned by a Yemeni expatriate.
Baraba said the exploration activities would include seismological surveys in an 800 km long area in the two sectors, including digging of two exploratory wells.
He said negotiations on signing a final agreement would start in two months.
Yemen's parliament has also approved a deal signed in Jan. 1997 with the independent British company Dove Energy.
Under the deal, the Yemeni government would contribute 25 % to the cost of exploration work in Sector 53 east of the Shabwa and Hadramout governorates.
Yemen, a country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, is a small independent oil producer with an output of 390,000 bpd.