French company Total, the top oil operator in the Republic of Congo, plans to increase its production by at least 20 percent by the year end, the state radio reported on Friday.
"The prospects in matters of petroleum production are good. At the end of the year Congo will be able to produce 300,000 barrels per day," the director of Total in Congo, Jacques Azibert, declared after having a meeting with the Congolese minister of economy and planning, Pierre Moussa.
With an output estimated at 250,000 barrels per day in the central African country, Total eyes the production rise based on the May 2008
discovery of a new oil field in Moho Bilondo, which is expected to produce up to 90,000 barrels per day.
"This is so remarkable because Congo had not reached this level for a long time," Azibert said, adding that the price of a barrel is currently
fluctuating between 60 U. S. dollars and 80 dollars.
The Republic of Congo is the fourth producer of the black gold in the sub-Saharan Africa after Angola, Nigeria, and Equatorial Guinea.
The industry represents its first export earnings and contributes more than 80 percent of the state budget.
NGOs say, however, the natural resource has not helped Congo since more than half of its 3.6 million people still live below the poverty line and survive on less than one dollar a day.