The Omani government has named Haifa Al Khaifi as the head of a new company that controls the country ‘s largest oil bloc, a rare role for a woman in a male – dominated region in the Middle East.
Al Khaifi will be chief executive of Energy Development Oman, which eventually owns 60% of the sultanate in Block 6, a large area capable of producing approximately 650,000 barrels of crude each day.
She comes from Development of Oman Petroleum LLC, a Gulf Persian oil and gas exploration and production company, where she was chief financial officer. Al Khaifi is too chairman of the Saudi Arabian unit of State Street Corp., the Boston-based custodian and money manager.
Bloomberg reported in November that Oman, which is struggling to fund a budget deficit that rose above last year, can issue about $ 3 billion of bonds from the back of Block 6. JPMorgan Chase & Co. advising the government on the plan, according to an expert.
Read: Oman is starting a new power company as it tries to shorten an oil block
EDO was founded in December and is interested in PDO as well as interest in Block 6, which contains about three – quarters of Oman ‘s oil. There is an EDO tasked by investing in conventional and renewable energy resources at home and abroad.
Ibrahim Al Eisri has been named chief financial officer, coming in from the investment funds of the Oman Investment Authority.
Almost all major energy companies in the Middle East are still run by men, although countries such as Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates have hired women to senior positions at their state-owned companies.
Although Oman is not a member of the Petroleum Exporting Countries Group, it is part of the cartel’s largest 23-nation group, known as OPEC +. That alliance has been hampering oil production since around May last year to raise prices against coronavirus pandemic.
Oman pumped 722,000 barrels of crude per day last month. Royal Dutch Shell Plc holds 34% of Block 6, while Total SE and Partex Oil & Gas have 4% 2%.
– Supported by Turki Al Balushi
(Updates with the role of State Street in the third paragraph.)