Algeria Minister Wants National Companies to Be More Efficient than Chinese

Algeria’s Minister of Energy Youcef Yousfi called on national energy companies to improve their competitiveness, saying that the country needs to mobilise all its industrial potential to create a bridge between the energy sector and all the Algerian companies. 

Asking companies to be more competitive than Chinese firms in terms of quality and costs, Yousfi also spoke about Sonatrach’s plans.

‘The development program designed by Sonatrach group for the period 2015-2019 encompasses about thirty treatment projects, 18 for natural gas and 11 for crude oil, drilling of 260 wells per year and that the completion of 26,000 km²/ year 3D seismic and 10,000 square kilometers of 2D seismic’ Algeria Press Service reported on Monday, referring to the meeting that took place on Sunday. 

Yousfi also spoke about domestic renewable energy, and plans to increase energy efficiency.

On Monday, Algerian officials met with Italy’s Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs Lapo Pistelli, on the sideline of the Italy-Algeria contact group meant to discuss ways to fight terrorism. 

“We intend to confront the terrorist threat together by implementing a concrete programme over the coming months” Pistelli commented as reported by the website of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.