Controversy over Peruvian oil contract for Block 192

The Peruvian government has become embroiled in a controversy over the country’s most productive oil field, Block 192. The governor of the Loreto region, where the oil field is located, announced that an indefinite general strike would start on Thursday to protest the central government’s decision to award the contract for operating the field to a foreign oil company. The regional government, together with local indigenous communities and civil society organizations, had demanded that only state oil company Perú-Petro operate the field.

However, Peruvian Minister of Energy and Mines Rosa María Ortiz denied claims that the government had awarded the contract to a foreign company. She emphasized that, “[Colombian oil company Omega] is one of the companies with which we have been negotiating, but nothing has been finalized with them. There are negotiations with three interested companies, and nothing has been finalized. These claims are totally baseless.”

Andina quoted Minister Ortiz as stressing that the situation with the local Loreto community is not a negotiation, but rather a dialogue. In this series of meetings, Minister Ortiz submitted a proposal that would allow the communities to share in the oil revenues through a locally-administered trust fund that supposedly would generate $1 billion for the communities over the next 30 years.