Russia oil prospecting far behind output

19.05.2004, 16.50

UFA, May 19 (Itar-Tass) - Russia’s oil output is two times the prospecting of new oilfields.

About 420 million tonnes of oil were extracted last year, but deposits storing only 200 million tonnes were uncovered, the president of the Russian Union of Oil and Gas Industrialists, Gennady Shmal, told Itar-Tass.

He attends an international industrial exhibition in Ufa.

Oil prospecting begins lagging behinds the output by tens of times.

This did not happen earlier, but this does not means that Russia is running out of charted oil, Shmal said.

New oilfields are to be found, but miserable sums are allocated to geologists for their work, he said.

Mineral resources are an area of responsibility of the state that must fund prospecting projects properly, he said.

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