The Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources will execute 11 development projects for $17.5m. The projects aim to develop gas fields in cooperation with foreign partners in order to compensate the natural declining rate in the productivity of fields and to increase production rates, reported Daily News Egypt.

A source at the ministry of petroleum stated that the development projects are expected to produce 1.9bf/d of gas and 50,000b/d of condensates.

Additionally, the ministry is in negotiations with foreign partners in order to speed up the projects to be able to achieve self-sufficiency of gas in Egypt by the end of 2019.

The source added that the Egyptian oil and gas sector boosted gas production after it processed $1.5b worth of projects. In addition it succeeded in maintaining crude oil production rates over the past years.

The sector is further implementing 12 projects with total investment $33b. The projects will be ongoing until 2019. The projects are meant to add 5.5bcf/d to 6.2bcf/d of gas as well as 28,500b/d of condensates.

The source further said that the government is speeding up gas expedition programs including the programs implemented in Zohr, North Alexandria, and Noras The programs are implemented with investments estimates at more than $27.7b. The projects production is aimed to reach of 5.1bcf/d of gas.