HOUSTON (U.S.A)- Minister of Energy Nourredine Bouterfa called Wednesday, in Houston (U.S.A), all American companies to invest in Algeria and to conclude fruitful and sustainable energy partnerships, adding that energy partnership between Algeria and the United States is “dense and old-standing.”
“We are working to increase the effort of exploration and development of deposits, the rise in refining capacities and the relaunch of the petrochemical industry, which is familiar to the city of Houston,” said the minister at the opening of the Algerian-American forum on energy, taking place in Houston (Texas).
“We call on American companies to come invest in these segments and thus lead to fruitful and sustainable partnerships, as are the partnerships between our two countries,” he added.
During this meeting, to which took part several officials of the Algerian energy sector and about thirty leads of American energy companies, the minister said that the energy relations and partnerships between the two countries are “dense and old-standing.”
Energy investments of American companies recorded a significant decline over the last years, dropping to USD100 millions in 2015 after reaching USD600 million in 2010.
The shale gas and oil booming in the United States has heavily weighed on Algerian exports to this country which are today at a modest level, at around two billion dollars in 2015, according to the numbers provided by the minister of Energy Noureddine Bouterfa.
The minister said that the forum is meant “to shed light on the opportunities, even the less obvious ones, that Algeria and the United States can seize to strengthen their cooperation and their business.”
He added that Algeria is leading “a dynamic of development that the President of the Republic Abdelaziz Bouteflika stimulated on the basis of an effective transition of an economy strongly based on the revenues of hydrocarbons and on public expenditure towards a diversified and wealth- creating economy.”
Source: Bouterfa calls, in Houston, all American companies to invest in Algeria
