OREANDA-NEWS. March 16, 2009. The Russian government has no plans to revise the terms of effective oil exploration licenses to form a system for state oil reserves, vice PM Igor Sechin said Sunday. Sechin first raised the issue of establishing state crude reserves last October. This February Energy Minister Sergey Shmatko said that within the next two or three months his ministry will submit to the government a concept for forming strategic oil reserves.

Sechin noted that at present under discussion is the option of forming oil reserves using various opportunities: to purchase crude oil through the Transneft-run system, book new fields and also using the licensing mechanism. According to him, the latter assumes that licenses will contain provisions about the possibility of increasing oil extraction volumes. “A company builds relevant infrastructure and begins to develop a field.

And if it becomes necessary it could provide an additional increment in oil output if the market environment is favorable,” the vice prime minister said. “We’re not going to revise the terms of existing licenses. At issue are new licenses,” Sechin specified.