The fourth Iran Petrochemical Forum (IPF 2002) was held on 18-19 May in Tehran. Several high-ranking Iranian government officials and senior executives from leading international companies attended the forum, including the Iranian Petroleum Minister, Bijan Namdar Zanganeh, who briefed the participants on the policies of Iranian government on developing the country's petrochemical sector. Meanwhile, NPC President, M. R. Nematzadeh talked about the latest details on the NPC plans since IPF 2001 and the company's future plans. Excerpts:



In his address to IPF 2002, Iranian Petroleum Minister, Bijan Namdar Zanganeh told the forum that Iran's abundant natural gas reserves is an undeniable advantage for developing the country's petrochemical sector and meeting its fuel requirements adding that the reserves can meet a large portion of the global demand.
He said enormous activities are underway to boost output capacity and processing of natural gas in both upstream and downstream sectors to meet the requirements of the national, regional and international markets as well as those of different economic sectors including the petrochemical industry. Pointing to the development of the South Pars gas field, Zanganeh said that each of the 10 development phases of South Pars will produce 28million m3 per day of gas & 40,000-barrels per day of condensates. He said that such activities will undoubtedly prepare the groundwork for rapid development of the petrochemical projects in terms of provision and availability of feedstock.
Zanganeh highlighted the government's policy concerning the development of the petrochemical industry which aimed at generating further added value from natural gas as well as condensates.This, he said, would boost the country's export.
In the past four years, he said, some $6 billion worth of contracts have been concluded for implementing petrochemical projects. So far, over $3 billion of this amount has been utilized either locally or abroad. Completion of these projects will give a robust momentum to the growth of Iran's economy especially in terms of creating jobs and developing the downstream industries.
Zanganeh stressed that NPC aims to raise its annual revenues from the export of petrochemicals to over $3,500 million and to increase the value of domestic sales to $2,000 million by the end of 2005.

Deputy Petroleum Minister and NPC President, Mohammad Reza Nematzadeh, provided the forum with an update on the achievements of the Iranian petrochemical industry and its prospects for future growth.
He told the forum that since IPF 2001, NPC has succeeded in completing a major part of its targeted goals. He pointed out that at the end of last year's fiscal year (20March 2002), NPC's total output reached 12.5 million tonnes, of which 8 million tonnes were final products. The figure was up by 7% over the preceding year.
In terms of sales, NPC also reached promising horizons. The total amount of domestic and export sales topped US$1800 million based on international prices. Nematzadeh explained that quantitatively exports represented some 50% of the NPC's total sales. Meanwhile, the share of petrochemicals in Iran's GNP reached 1.5%.
He told the participants at the 4th IPF that the projects of phases 1&2 of the NPC's development plan were expected to be completed by the end of 2003, while 3rd phase projects were planned to become operational by the end of 2005. With the completion of the projects, he said, NPC's total output capacity would double in 3 years to reach 30 million tonnes.
Nematzadeh said, in 2001 NPC finalized contracts for several new projects. These included an 80,000 tonne isocyanates, the 300,000-tonne LDPE plant of Marun, the 600,000-tonnes ethyl-benzene and styrene-monomer plants of Pars, a 1 million tonnes per year urea and ammonia plant in Assaluyeh, and in early 2002 the centralized utility complex consisting of a 700 MW power plant, an industrial gas plant, and a water treatment package which will be constructed at our Pars Special Economic/Energy Zone.
At the same time, tenders are being processed for a number of other projects including a 300,000 tonne/year chlore-Alkali and PVC, Kharg Olefin, Jam Alpha-Olefin, a 150,000 tonne/year VAM and the 300,000 tonne/year LDPE in Amir Kabir.
He said NPC has concluded negotiations for two joint investments with international companies. The first investment involves the production of 80,000 tonnes of isocynates in partnership with Chemature of Sweden and Hansa Chemie of Germany and the second one is for the production of 300,000 tonnes of polyethylene in partnership with DSM of the Netherlands together with an Iranian company. NPC is also in talks with several companies for a number of other projects under final stages of economic evaluation.

A call for regional cooperation was made by the Iranian Petroleum Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh as well as Iran's Deputy Petroleum Minister and NPC President, M. R. Nematzadeh. Speaking at the 4th Iran Petrochemical Forum, which was held on 18-19 May 2002 in Tehran, Zanganeh said regional cooperation was of paramount importance not only politically but also economically. He underscored the necessity of promoting regional cooperation in production of petrochemicals, particularly those products that depended on gas as their feed.
Zanganeh urged that regional cooperation and close relationship amongst neighbors in the field of petrochemical industries could yield valuable results for both producers and consumers at a global level. He said cooperation would improve economic productivity generating benefits to everybody.

" We appeal to our neighboring countries for the broadening of economic cooperation and division of work based on common interests", Zanganeh said.
He suggested that such cooperation could be initiated, in the first place, in areas such as exchange of information, engineering work, implementation of joint projects and removal of customs barriers.
Zanganeh stipulated that "Concurrent with such measures, we need to mull over other moves and, with comprehensive consultations, drive our regional cooperation to joint investment and merger of companies in order to complete our production chain, and to improve the return of our investments". He concluded that such a policy could ensure further success for oil, gas and petrochemical projects for all the regional countries.
Also speaking at the forum, NPC President M. R. Nematzadeh said that in 2001 regional cooperation remained on the NPC's agenda. He said that NPC took effective measures with its counterparts in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and Egypt for commercial and technical collaborations as well as joint investment studies.