According to Shana's correspondent report, in this ceremony the contracts to develop remaining phases of the giant South Pars gas field including phases 13, 14,19, 22, 23 and 24 was signed with domestic companies.

The contract to develop phase 13 was signed with a consortia comprising of Mapna, Sadra and Petro pidar Iranian companies and the phase 14 with another consortia consisting of Industrial Development and Renovation Organization (IDRO), National Iranian Drilling Company (NIDC) and Iran Offshore Engineering Construction Company (IOEC).

By developing phases 13 and 14, daily output of sour gas from South Pars gas field will increase by 3 billion cubic feet. In addition, the project plans to transfer produced gas to a gas processing plant in the Pars Special Economic Energy Zone, processing and separating of 110 thousands barrels of gas condensate. The produced gas is going to be sweetened and converted to LNG.

Development of the phase 19 was assigned to the Petropars Company and Iran Offshore Engineering and Construction Company (IOEC), and phases 22, 23 and 24 were handed over to the Petro Sina Arian and Sadra companies.

Producing of 50 million cubic meters of processed gas, 75.000 barrels of gas condensate and 400 tons of sulfur per day and annual production of 1.05 million tons of LPG and one million tons of ethane are among the targets of development of the phase.

The aim of phases 22, 23 and 24 development is to produce 42.5 million cubic meters of natural gas, 57 thousand barrels of gas condensate and 300 tons of sulfur per day. The three phases also are designed to produce 800 thousands of LNG and 750 thousand tons of ethane per year.

Before signing the contracts, the petroleum minister and other officials visited ongoing phases of South Pars gas field including phases 15, 16, 17 and 18.

Phases 15 and 16 with 45 percent, phases 17 and 18 with 40 percent and phase 12 with 30 percent physical progress are among the ongoing projects of the South Pars gas field development.

Earlier deputy minister of petroleum in gas affairs, engineer Javad Oji,  had said that by coming into stream of ongoing projects in the South Pars project, natural gas output of the country would stand at 900 million cubic meters per day in next three years. He also added that gas consumption in the country would shrink by 30 percent following implementation of the reforming subsidies plan.

Talking to reporters on the sidelines of signing ceremony of the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline on Sunday, Mr. Oji said that current gas output from the country's onshore and offshore fields amount to 600 million cubic meters per day.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Mr. Oji said that at the end of the fifth five-year plan (2010-2015), total gas output would rise to 1.1 billion cubic meters.

The South Pars field is a gas condensate field located in the Persian Gulf. It is the world’s largest gas field and is shared by Iran and Qatar. According to the International Energy Agency, the field holds an estimated 50.97 trillion cubic meters (1800 trillion cubic feet) of in-situ gas and some 50 billion barrels of condensates.

Iran holds has the world’s second-largest reserves of natural gas and the third-largest reserves of oil.