Putin celebrates Gazprom’s 30th anniversary and accuses the West of “unfair competition”

The Russian president marked this Friday the 30th anniversary of Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned energy company, which, according to Vladimir Putin, continues to grow despite “unfair competition” from the West and international sanctions.

“Despite, let’s say, open and unfair competition and attempts from abroad to hinder and restrain its development, Gazprom continues to move forward and launch new projects,” Putin said during a video conference.

Putin stressed that the potential and “huge reserves” exploited by the company are “incomparable” to those of other gas exporting countries.

In 30 years, the company has produced more than 13 billion cubic meters of gas and discovered 92 new fields, to which reserves must be added to produce almost 35 billion cubic meters, which doubled production last year.

“I can assure our consumers that there will be plenty of gas in Russia for many decades to come,” Putin said.

Gazprom’s future plans, according to Putin, “completely meet the interests, tasks and priorities of Russia as a great power, one of the sovereign centers of the multipolar world.”

“The decision to keep it as a single complex turned out to be correct from a strategic point of view. Gazprom, with its social programs, has grown, supported and pulled up many industries and entire regions. He became one of the engines of the economic revival. and growth”, appreciated.

The Kremlin leader assured that he discussed the company’s plans with the President of “Gazprom” Alexei Miller now, when “perestroika” is underway because of the war in Ukraine. [reconstrução] supply routes and demand for markets alternative to Europe.

In this regard, Gazprom reported that “in the near future, Russia may become the largest supplier of gas to China.”

To this end, the company will soon launch the Power of Siberia-2 gas pipeline project, which will supply gas to China through Mongolia, the operation of which will begin in 2024.

Russia plans to supply 48 billion cubic meters of gas annually in the coming years, far exceeding the 15.5 billion delivered in 2022, and it wants to reach 100 billion cubic meters in the future.

The company also considers it one of its priorities to establish a major international distribution center in Turkey to circumvent Western sanctions.

For his part, Putin assured that “gas will for a long time be the most valuable resource, a real asset, the demand for which will not stop growing.”

The President of Russia recalled that over the past 30 years, gas consumption has almost doubled, and predicts that in the next 20 years it will increase by at least 20%.

“More than half of this increase will come from the countries of the Asia-Pacific region, especially, of course, China, given the growth rate of its economy,” he said.

Gas exports from Russia fell by 25.1% in 2022, a sharp decline partially offset by a 48% increase in supplies to China, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said this week.

The aforementioned drop in exports “is associated both with objective reasons, with the refusal of European countries to buy Russian gas, and with sabotage against the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines,” he explained.

Gazprom, a Russian state-owned company, was founded during the Soviet Union (1989) but only became private on February 17, 1993.

Miller, a close associate of the Russian president, has led a consortium since 2001 that has been widely criticized in the West for its lack of transparency, which the Kremlin sees as a tool of geopolitical influence.