Mexico & Nafta - 9 December 2003

A study by Russian oilmen claims that Mexico could become a net exporter of natural gas in the next five years, if foreign companies were allowed to bring their expertise to bear on the industry. The study, by Gernady Shmal, president of the Russian oil and gas industries' association, and Valentin Karelin, the research director of a company called Intellect, claims that Mexico has a lot of gas which is not exploited by Pemex. The Russians maintain that they have developed a technology which can not only 'sniff' oil and gas but also determine almost immediately whether the field is of a commercial size. The Russians say that they faced the same problems as Mexico: the state could not finance the oil industry, so they privatised the industry (in 1990) and saw a flood of foreign investment.