Nigeria, others plan new bank for joint gas projects

INDICATIONS have emerged that the 13-nation Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) may soon set up a new bank to finance its joint projects
  The decision was reached after a discussion by the group, which the new head of the group- Mohammad Hossein Adeli, from Iran disclosed.
  The members of the group include Nigeria, Algeria, Bolivia, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Libya, Oman, Trinidad and Tobago and the United Arab Emirates. 
  Others are Venezuela, which controls 62 per cent of world gas reserves, Russia and Qatar, the two largest exporters in the GECF, according to a report
 Adeli said in interview yesterday from the group’s headquarters in Qatar’s capital, Doha, said the bank was discussed at an earlier meeting of the 13-nation group, but has not been followed up recently.
  “The idea of helping each other in investment, in financing projects, and in long-term plans for investment is something that has already come up,” he said.
Adeli, who replaced Russia’s Leonid Bokhanovsky, as the Secretary-General of the GECF at the start of the year, is seeking to foster closer cooperation just as international rivalry increases. 
  Qatari liquefied natural gas is competing with Russian pipeline exports in Europe. LNG shipments planned for the second half of this decade from the U.S. may disrupt established suppliers to Asia.
  Though GECF has sometimes been dubbed the “gas OPEC,” it hasn’t sought to influence prices by adjusting production, as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries does with crude oil and such minimal interference in the market is unlikely to change, Adeli said.
“I have not seen attempts by any country to go in this direction. Given the nature of the gas, it’s not possible,” he said.
Adeli, Iran’s former deputy foreign minister and central bank governor, told reporters after his election in Tehran, last year, that he wants to help his country become a “major player among the gas exporting countries.”
  He said that he will represent all GECF members and not his country, adding that  “Iran is not leading this organization. I am leading this organization.”
Iran’s own efforts to export LNG to world markets have been hampered by U.S. and European Union sanctions that have limited access to technology and international expertise. 
  The country is forced to burn off billions of dollars worth of the fuel produced from oil fields each year because of lack of infrastructure to bring it to market, according to the World Bank’s Global Gas Flaring Reduction Public-Private Partnership.
  According to him, in “few months” the GECF will increase transparency by starting to issue regular reports on subjects including supply, prices, shale gas, developments in different countries, and hub pricing, 
 “This is our intention, to indigenously develop our own views about gas,” and then share them with the public, he added.
 International oil companies including Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) and Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) have been invited to a meeting with the GECF at the end of this month, he said.

Source Nigerian Guardian