Tunisia’s Nawara natural gas field started production on Wednesday, and it will increase national gas output by 50%, prime minister Youssef Chahed said.
The project is jointly owned by Austria’s OMV and the Tunisian National Oil Company ETAP with an investment of some $1.25 billion.
The Nawara project in the south of the country is among other programmes the government is counting on to raise production and reduce the national energy deficit by 20% and cut the trade deficit by 7%.
“It is a historic day in Tunisia ...a project worth 3.5 billion dinar ($1.25 billion) has started, with capacity production of 2.7 million cubic metres of gas per day,” Chahed said.
He also said the project would boost economic growth by 1%.
Tunisia will raise production of natural gas to about 65,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.
