Seoul — The Angolan government is currently outlining strategies to mitigate the natural decline of oil production, which has been falling by around 10 to 15 percent per year, due to the time and maintenance of existing wells, the secretary of State for Oil and Gas José Barroso has said.

Jose Barroso, who was speaking on the sidelines of the delivery ceremony of the State oil company new oil tanker, said to reverse the curve, which sometimes is below 1 million barrels output per day, an effort is being made to reach 1.1 million barrels, through exploration campaigns and programmes to drill new wells and develop new ones.

The secretary of State pointed to gas as a product of energy transition for Angola, underscoring the need to adapt to world trends, where the country has its own plans and programmes to develop gas fields, with the aim to generate revenues to help the economy.

"What we want today, with the constitution that we have agreed to call New Gas Consortium, is to explore, develop and produce gas fields. We will start producing two already known fields, Kilumba and Mabuqueia, then others will follow", he said.

Barroso said the idea is to start developing these fields, while looking for others, to reach the capacity for the Angola LNG plant to continue operating and the gas to serve other economic purposes.

He then disclosed that there are plans to build a steelworks in Namibe Province.

Another plan already underway, Barros said, is the construction of a fertiliser factory whose main product will be gas.

"Today in Soyo we are building a fertiliser factory, the main product that will power that factory is gas.In Soyo, we have a Combined Cycle Power Plant, so part of the electricity generated by thermoelectric power plants in the country will also be produced by gas."