The leases held by state oil giant Petrobras for two offshore oilfields have been extended 27 years by Brazil’s oil industry regulator the National Petroleum Agency (ANP), according to Reuters.
ANP said on Tuesday that the concessions for the Marlim and Voador fields were intended to encourage new investment in the fields.
The Marlim field – Brazil’s fifth largest which began producing in 1985 – is in the north-eastern part of Campos Basin, about 110km offshore Rio de Janeiro. The Voador field is adjacent to it.
ANP is a federal government agency linked to the Ministry of Mines and Energy. It monitors and inspects industries in the energy sector.
Petrobras needs all the help it can get as it its reputation has been tarnished by the huge bribes-for-inflated-contracts scandal of the past two years and its bottom line has been further hurt by the global slump in oil prices.
Also on Tuesday, O Globo newspaper reported that Petrobras could soon have a new CEO in the form of Pedro Parente, a former engineer and CEO of agribusiness firm Bunge Brasil.
Parente is the preferred appointment of Brazil’s interim national president Michel Temer to replace incumbent Aldemir Bendine.
Temer, who himself last week replaced the suspended and set-to-be-impeached President Dilma Rousseff, thinks Parente’s management skills could help Petrobras improve its dire financial state as the world’s most indebted oil company.
