OREANDA-NEWS. January 19, 2011. In December Azerbaijan’s oil production decreased as compared with November. For 2010 crude oil production by all producers in Azerbaijan has totaled 379.2 million barrels against 375.807 million barrels for 2009 and 332.07 million barrels for 2008.

The State Statistics Committee (SSC) informs that as of 1 January 2010 the country produced 50.8 million tons of oil that is 0.9% more against 2009. In December 2010 production reached 3.7 million tons against 4.178 million in November, 4.37 million tons in October, 4.297 million tons in September and 4.513 million tons in August (the best index for 2010). In 2009 the best figure was registered in May (4.518 million tons).

Since this October Azerbaijan has not published statistics of oil production by foreign operating companies.

Nevertheless, over 2010 the state sector extracted 7.226 million tons (-0.4% year-on-year) and the non-state sector 43.607 million tons (+1.1%).

Over January-September 2010 the Azerbaijani International Operating Company (the major non-state producer developing oilfield block Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli) produced 32.2 million tons of oil that is by 2.5% more versus January-September 2009.

In September 2010 the AIOC production was 3.6 million tons against 3.8 million tons in August, 3.7 million tons in July, 3.5 million tons in June and 3.7 million tons in April (the best indices for 2010). In 2009 the best index was registered in June (4.3 million tons).

In 2009 oil production was 50.376 million tons that is by 13.5% more than in 2008, including AOIC’s production of 41.9 million tons. In 2008, the country produced 44.46 million tons of oil (+4.6% against 2007), including 35.9 million tons of oil (+5.3%) by AIOC.