BP, Royal Dutch Shell and Exxon Mobil were negotiating a deal each. Shell is negotiating another deal together with BHP Billiton, while Chevron and Total together are working on a fifth deal.
Each deal was to boost Iraqi output by around 100,000 barrels per day (bpd). But Iraq was making progress on its own on the fields, and the longer the contracts take to sign, the harder it will be for majors to add 100,000 bpd of additional output at each field, he said.
Shahristani blamed the delay in signing on the oil companies, which he said were concerned about the mechanism of payment in oil through the Iraq Development Fund.
"Iraq wants long-term development contracts that it will offer in a first bidding round this summer to come into effect from the middle of next year" Shahristani said.
He declined to give the length of the contracts or more details on payment. The terms of the contract would be based on service contracts, as there was no risk involved in developing already-producing fields.
The contracts will be for Iraq's already producing giant oilfields in the south and around Kirkuk in the north. The list of fields to be offered in the round had yet to be finalised, he added.
Source: Reuters
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