PERSIA REJOICES

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 6, 5 December 1932, Page 5

PERSIA REJOICES

CANCELLED OIL CONCESSION. (United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) < . TEHERAN, Dec. 2. The whole city is illuminated in celebration of the Government’s' annulment of the Darcy concession of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. The Anglo-Persian Oil Company, Limited, was registered in London in 1909 to work the concession originally obtained from the Persian Government by Mr D’Arcy. This concession was to run for 60 years from May 28, 1901, and gave the exclusive right to drill for, produce, pipe and carry away natural gas, petroleum, asphalt, etc., throughout the Persian Empire, except in tile provinces of Azarbaijan, Gilan, Mazandaran, Astrabad and Khurasan, namely, an area of about 500,000 square miles. After much unsuccessful drilling in the neighbourhood of Quasri-i-Shirm and elsewhere oil was struck in large quantities in 1903 in the provinco of Khuzistan, South-west Persia, at Mas-jid-i-Sulaiman. By 1913 the company was in need of further capital and, as the British Admiralty was then anxious to secure fresh sources of supply for its fuel oil, the Government entered into an agreement and purchased a large number of shares. Important supply contracts still subsist between the Admiralty and the company. Through the British Tanker Company the Anglo-Persian Oil Company controls about 80 tank steamers, all built in Britain, and having a total carrying capacity of more than 700,000 tons. Through subsidiary companies it operates refineries 1 in South Wales and Scotland, and, through associated companies, in France, Australia and Argentina. The greater part of the present crude production is refined at Abadan, in Persia. The company’s main production is still obtained from Masjid-i-Sulainian, and is conveyed by pipe lines to its refinery at Abadan, a distance of 145 miles; A limited production of oil is also obtained by the company at Naft Kliana, in Irak. This field may he formed to extend into

Persian territory. The main Persian oil belt, in which oil has been proved in a total area of 30 square miles, comprises a tract which extends into Irak, and there appears to be a fundamental geological concordance throughout the whole belt.

The production of oil from the Persian field for the years ending March 31, 1921-27, was as follow:—1921, 1,743,557 tons: 1922, 2,327,221; 1923, 2,959,023; 1924, 3,714,216; 1925. 4.333,933; 1926, 4,556,157; 1927, 4,806,667. All this oil was ‘obtained from large flowing wells, others being held in reserve to meet the constant expansion of the company’s trade. Of the yearly net profits, 16 per cent is payable to the Persian Government, which received on tins account from 1921 to 1927 the following sums:—l92l. £535.290; 1922, £593,429; 1923, £533.251: 1924. £377.575; 1925, £824.036; 1926. £l,048,135 1927, £1,341,963. The company employs in Persia 26,000 people, most of whom are Persians.