ONGC to invest Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan

New Delhi, Apr 8 (UNI) ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), the overseas arm of state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, plans to invest in gas fields in Uzbekistan.

The concrete outcome is expected to come during the coming six-day visit of Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh with his team to Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan starting from April 10.

Along with ONGC Videsh Ltd Managing Director, he will pursue India's interests for oil and gas exploration in Azerbaijan, as ONGC Videsh has identified some promising prospects to be developed.

Mr Ramesh is leading a multi-sectoral Indian delegation to Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan from April 10-16, to boost bilateral economic relationships covering both investment and trade.

He will sign the first-ever agreement with Azerbaijan for establishing the India-Azerbaijan Intergovernmental Commission on trade, economic, scientific and technological cooperation.

Accompanied by senior officials of GAIL, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, he will also pursue with the Uzbek government the projects identified by GAIL for investment in Uzbekistan in petrochemicals, LPG and city gas distribution.

Moreover, GAIL has identified four natural gas exploration and production blocks as prospective ones in Uzbekistan, one of the top natural gas producing countries in the world, on which it would like to move forward.

Azerbaijan also has vast resources of minerals and metals, senior officials from MMTC and the National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) are accompanying Mr Ramesh, to explore the possibilities of entering into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for cooperation in the mineral sector with the Azerbaijan government.

In Tashkent, Mr Ramesh will chair the Seventh Session of the India-Uzbekistan Intergovernmental Commission.

In addition, Mr Ramesh will review the status of implementation of the MoU signed in November 2006 between the Uzbekistan government and The Cotton Textiles Export Promotion Council of India (TEXPROCIL) for enhancing cooperation in the cotton textile sector.

The public sector State Trading Corporation is also exploring a 10-million-dollar investment in Uzbekistan for cottonseed processing. An Indian private company Spentex has already acquired two cotton spinning factories in Uzbekistan investing close to 80-million-dollar.

Accompanied by senior officials of MMTC and the National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC), Mr Ramesh will also explore opportunities of intensified cooperation in gold, Uzbekistan having the fourth largest gold reserves in the world and India now being the world's largest importer of gold (700-800 tonnes per year).

The Indo-CIS Chamber is organising a substantive buyer-seller meet in Tashkent on April 13 and RITES has made proposals for modernising and expanding Uzbekistan's railway network.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had visited Uzbekistan in April 2006 and Mr Mani Shankar Aiyar had visited Azerbaijan in June 2005.

For both Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan, Mr Ramesh is also accompanied by senior officials of the Department of Commerce, Ministry of External Affairs, Culture, Petroleum and Natural Gas and Science and Technology, apart from representatives of RITES, and business delegations from FICCI, CII and the Indo-CIS Chamber of Commerce in case of Uzbekistan.

UNI