China's Largest Inland Oilfield to Decrease Production

China's largest oilfieled Daqing is expected to reduce its production starting 2015.

MOSCOW, December 28 (Sputnik) — Daqing Oilfield, the largest oilfield explored by China's major oil and gas producer PetroChina, is expected to reduce its production starting 2015, as reported by Xinhua News.

As discussed at an economic conference of northeast China's Heilongjiang province on Saturday, Daqing Oilfield, which produces nearly one-fourth of China's total annual oil output, will see an output reduction of 1.5 million tons next year.

As China's largest inland oilfield, Daqing has produced more than 2.1 billion tons of crude oil since production started in 1960.

According to Xinhua, the reason for reducing output is limited oil reserves, high cost of development and declining international oil prices.

One Daqing worker said that a suitable modification of output could allow the oilfield to develop sustainably and give more time to research on new technologies.

It is a matter of concern, however, that output target reduction may put pressure on China’s Heilongjiang province. The initial estimate showed that the province's GDP and fiscal revenue in 2015 would decrease by more than 20 billion yuan (3.2 billion U.S. dollars) and about six billion yuan, respectively.

In order to lessen the burden on the local economy, Heilongjiang province plans to accelerate its economic reform and extend cooperation with PetroChina by promoting oil refining projects.