OREANDA-NEWS. Igor Sechin, president of Rosneft is satisfied by the level of growth of operations between Venezuela and Russia, which shows the recent interest of Russian companies in the Venezuelan energy sector. Mr. Sechin headed a delegation from the Russian Federation during the signing of agreements between the two nations.

“The number of Russian companies operating in Venezuela is growing. We have a lot of work ahead of us. Today, we took a step forward in the strengthening of our relations with Venezuela. We can say that in the near future we will be producing 50 million tons, with Rosneft’s participation reaching 15 million tons, equivalent to 50 thousand barrels of crude per day, with an investment of approximately 10 billion dollars in these projects”, said Sechin.

According to Rosneft’s president, these expenditures will have the leverage of financial entities such as Gazprombank, among others, to support oil operations. “We are going to use all the Russian or foreign banks; it won’t make any difference, all financial instruments will be used to do this work”, he said.

Furthermore, he said that oil investments are made with environmental awareness. He announced that a joint study is being conducted on the construction of a power plant with petroleum coke combustion.

During the signing of agreements, Rafael Ramirez, People’s Minister of Petroleum and Mining and president of PDVSA, talked about conversations that are taking place for a heavy crude world conference in September or October 2013 in Venezuela.

He also said that there was an agreement to deepen the academic exchange in the areas of graduate studies in oil and reservoirs, at the prestigious Gubkin Russian State University of Oil and Gas.