Press Releases
GAIL organizing Asia Gas Partnership Summit Focus: Cross Border Gas trade
GAIL (India) Limited
(New Delhi, 18th February 2006.)
New Delhi, 18th February 2006.GAIL is organizing the 4th Asia Gas Partnership Summit (AGPS) during February 20-21, 2006 at Hotel Shangri La, New Delhi. Hon’ble Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Government of India, Mr. Murli Deora has kindly consented to inaugurate the event. The event will be followed by an International Gas Union Conference during February 22-23, 2006, globally known as the “Spring-Meet”, held for the first time in India.
This is the 4th Conference being organized by GAIL (India) Limited. The earlier three conferences were organized in association with FICCI and supported by International Gas Union. The 3rd Asia Gas Buyers’ Summit organized at New Delhi during February 14-15, 2005 was attended by more than 500 participants from 25 countries.
This Conference is a GAIL initiative, started in the year 2003, to provide a platform for the niche gas players in the Asian continent, to collaborate on issues of common interest. Started as the Asia Gas Buyers Summit, this forum has now expanded its horizons to cover a much wider range of issues and subjects impacting all ‘partners’ in the Natural Gas business, beyond just gas buying and selling, and hence the change of nomenclature to Asia Gas Partnership Summit, has been a natural and logical step.
The gas markets in Asia are expected to grow at the fastest rate in the next 20 years led by India and China. While LNG trade has brought in easier movement and flexibilities in gas trade between countries, Trans-national Gas pipelines would establish stronger bond among nations and address the energy security concerns of countries. It is an accepted fact that gas market dynamics is undergoing rapid changes, which have important commercial implications.
It is against this background that GAIL has taken a series of initiatives aimed at availing of the opportunities in countries such as Egypt, China, Iran, Myanmar, Russia, Kazakhstan, Bangladesh, Turkey, and Romania.
The conference would focus on the “Cross Border Gas Trade” covering a wide range of topics including Global Exploration and Production and Marketing of Gas, Cross Country Transit of Gas, Financing Cross Border Gas Trade, Geopolitical Risks and Risk Management, International Gas Laws and Regulation and Pricing strategies of cross border gas.
Natural gas is widely acknowledged as the ‘fuel of the future’ and of its increasingly crucial role in advancing long term global energy supply security, economic stability and environmental sustainability. However, there are still issues that need to be deliberated upon and resolved before the road to a cleaner and greener environment is ensured. In keeping with its tradition of closely examining the opportunities as well as concerns associated with the natural gas trade, this year’s summit too promises to be a premier event, not only in terms of the importance of topics being discussed, but also in terms of bringing to India, the ‘who’s who’ of global energy majors.
Though the topics in themselves are extremely thought provoking, what makes them more interesting is the presence of a number of high profile and extremely erudite speakers participating in the summit. Apart from the Hon’ble Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas, Shri Murli Deora, experts such as Dr. Kirit Parikh, Member (Energy), Planning Commission; Mr. Mukhtar Ahmed, Advisor on Energy to the Prime Minister, Pakistan; Mr. George H.B. Verberg, President, International Gas Union will be participating in the summit.