Bosnian Government Signs Preliminary Exploration Deal With Shell

The Government of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina (FBiH) today announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Shell Exploration Company BV, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell plc,  allowing the company to survey potential oil and gas fields in the country.

The signing was attended by Federation Prime Minister Nermin Niksic, Minister of Energy, Mining and Industry Erdal Trhulj for the Bosnian government and Marcus Antonini and Michael Foley for Shell.

"Geological exploration of oil and gas activities are of strategic interest for the Federation," Prime Minister Nilsic said. "The implementation of activities envisaged under this Memorandum will ensure conditions for possible oil and gas in the FBiH. In this way, the Government of the Federation has implemented its commitment to the intensification of economic development and attracting international investment, this time in research and development resources, hydrocarbons, in which Shell has just acquired the best experience around the world."

As part of the agreement, the Federation will provide equipment and expertise to the company. The government will also hand over all information held by the Federal Bureau of Geology and engineering company Energoinvest relating to research undertaken before the Bosnian war, which ended in 1995. The government statement says that Shell will conduct "digitized geological and geophysical review of the data, as well as the structural reconstruction of the tectonic crown."

Should Shell be successful in its exploration for gas and oil, the government says the first well can be expected for 2013, with exploitation expected by 2015. The country will begin work on best practice laws in the interim.