Egypt recently announced that it has exceeded its production rate of 650,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) for the first time since the late 1950s.

Atef Hassa, Head of Petrobel told Al-Monitor that Egypt is currently producing about 1.1 billion cubic feet of gas per day and almost 700,000 bpd of crude oil, after the development of production fields in the Gulf of Suez.

According to the Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek el-Molla, at the general meeting of the General Petroleum Company of Egypt that held last month, the Company will aim to boost the development of new oil wells and infrastructure.

Most of Egypt’s crude oil production is from the Western Desert region with 56% of output coming from that region, the Gulf of Suez accounts for 23% of the production rate, the Eastern Desert accounts for 12% of the production rate and the Sinai Peninsula accounts for 9% of the production rate.

The non-OPEC member but very important North African oil-producing country’s crude oil production numbers are modest, but its water in the Mediterranean hold the largest natural gas discovery in the Mediterranean Sea, the large Zohr field that began production in 2018.

After the commencement of the Zohr field, the member country of the Organisation of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) became a key player in the Mediterranean as the field played an essential role in aiding Egypt to avoid importing Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to the country.

Egypt is described as the centre of a ‘natural gas rush’ in the Eastern Mediterranean after Italian oil and gas company, Eni, discovered the Zohr field in 2015. It was tagged as the largest-ever gas discovery in the Mediterranean.