The Vietsovpetro joint venture enterprise and the Vietnam-Russia-Japan company (VRJ) welcomed on March 5 the first flow of oil from the Nam Rong-Doi Moi oilfield.

Vietsovpetro and the VRJ invested more than 342 million USD in drilling and installing rigs for 10 wells along with other facilities under a cooperation agreement signed last June.

The first industrial oil flow was pumped from Nam Rong-Doi Moi on Jan. 26 this year. With its four current wells, the oilfield has an output of 700 tonnes per day.

In order to take associated gas and gas lift, Vietsovpetro on the same day started work on construction of the Rong-Doi Moi gas compressing rig with a total investment of 149.6 million USD. The Vietnam National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) is the investor.

The project is scheduled to be put into operation late this year.

Vietsovpetro plans to tap 6-6.2 million tonnes of crude oil and 595 million cu.m of gas next year. With an estimated average price of 495 USD per tonne, its turnover would be worth more than 3 billion USD./.