BP and Eni are investing in Egypt like nowhere else

According to Bloomberg, Eni SpA will start producing from the giant Zohr natural gas field off Egypt’s Mediterranean coast by the end of 2017 and plans to invest $10 billion in the North African country over the next five years, Chief Executive Officer Claudio Descalzi said.
Production plans for Zohr are on schedule, and Egypt will be Eni’s top country for investment in the next two years, Descalzi said at a conference in Cairo. BP Plc, which bought a 10 percent stake in Zohr from Eni last year, invested more in Egypt in 2016 than in any other country and will do so again this year, the company’s CEO Bob Dudley said at the same event.
Egypt plans to boost its gas output by 50 percent by the end of 2018, from 3.8 billion cubic feet at the end of last year, Oil Minister Tarek El-Molla said at the conference.
BP plans to start producing at the West Nile Delta project this spring, Dudley said in an interview in Cairo.
Egypt’s government will announce a new bidding round for licenses to explore in nine areas in the next six months, El Masry said, and it “may” make a payment to Shell in the second quarter. El Masry said on Feb. 2 that the country will start exporting gas in 2019.