Algeria posts $20b in oil revenues for 2020

ALGIERS, Jan 18, (KUNA): Algeria’s Ministry of Energy and Mining announced Monday a significant decrease in the volume of oil exports in Algeria and its revenues in the year 2020, underlining that “the overall volume of hydrocarbon exports reached 82.2 million tonnes of oil equivalent in 2020, for a value of USD 20 billion, a decrease of 11 percent and 40 percent respectively compared to 2019.”

COVID-19 and its repercussions are the main reasons for the decline in the prices of black gold derivatives, which led to the deterioration of the economy, the ministry said in a statement.

The average oil price ranged at USD 42 per barrel (pb) during 2020 compared to USD 64 pb during the year 2019, showing a decline of nearly USD 23 pb or down 35 percent, it mentioned.

By taking into account the other exports of the energy sector, which include petrochemicals and others, it is expected that the value of the sector’s total exports will exceed USD 22 billion (18.19 billion euro) in 2020, it pointed out.

With regard to state revenues, tax revenues of the public treasury decreased by 32 percent during 2020 compared to 2019, and as for investments, their volume reached USD 7.3 billion in 2020, about a 30 percent decrease as opposed to investments in 2019, which were estimated at USD 10.2 billion, it said.

It was stated in the annual summary that the bill for importing petroleum products decreased to less than USD 700 million, or down 50 percent compared to 2019 imports, according to the same source.

It is worth including that the Minister of Energy confirmed during an open session in the parliament at the end of last year that a decline in oil revenues had been recorded due to the pandemic, which caused the collapse of oil prices and a decline in income.