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Roundup: Chevron announces sale of Bangladeshi gas fields to Chinese investors

Xinhua, April 24, 2017 Adjust font size:

Chevron Corporation has announced the conditional sale of its gas fields in Bangladesh to Chinese investors.

The U.S. company said its wholly-owned subsidiary, Chevron Global Ventures, Ltd., has entered into an agreement to sell the shares of its wholly-owned indirect subsidiaries operating in Bangladesh to Himalaya Energy Co. Ltd, which is owned by China ZhenHua Oil, a Chinese state-backed oil explorer, and CNIC Corporation, an investment company in Hong Kong.

Chevron Bangladesh operates Block 12 (Bibiyana Field) and Blocks 13 and 14 (Jalalabad and Moulavi Bazar fields).

"Closing of the transaction is subject to the satisfaction of certain closing conditions," it said in a press release posted to its website Monday.

The company, however, did not say how much it is going to generate from the deal.

The U.S. company Chevron had earlier reportedly sought 2 billion U.S. dollars in sale of Bangladesh gas fields.

To counter a prolonged slump in energy prices, Chevron last year announced to sell about 10 billion U.S. dollars worth of assets in Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines by this year.

Through Chevron subsidiaries, the company operates three Bangladeshi fields, Bibiyana, Jalalabad and Moulavi Bazar, under production-sharing contracts (PSC) signed with the Bangladeshi government, represented by Bangladesh's Ministry of Energy & Mineral Resources, and state-run Bangladesh Oil, Gas and Mineral Corporation, or Petrobangla.

According to Chevron website, its net daily production in 2015 averaged 720 million cubic feet of natural gas and 3,000 barrels of condensate which is liquid hydrocarbon produced with natural gas.

Amid growing apprehensions that the U.S. oil and gas giant Chevron may exit Bangladesh without sharing a due part of its profit with its employees, the country's High Court Division bench on April 11 directed the government not to release the due funds of employers of Chevron Bangladesh to the company.

The High Court bench of Justice Zinat Ara and Justice Kazi Md Ejarul Haque Akondo came up with the order following a writ petition filed by 538 Chevron employees on Dec. 15 last year.

Petitioners' lawyer Barrister Omar Sadat told journalists that Chevron employees worry that they will not have their due payments under "Workers Participation Fund" if it leaves Bangladesh by selling its shares.

According to the lawyer, some 76 million U.S. dollars are due to the employers of Chevron since 2006. Endit