Sonatrach Group, is considering increasing natural gas supply to countries such as Egypt and Jordan as part of efforts to boost its own production.

According to chief executive officer Amine Mazouzi (photo), company is negotiating the supply of liquefied natural gas to Egypt, which plans to issue a tender and is also eyeing other Middle Eastern markets like Jordan.Algeria is boosting output after declines in the past years, due to ageing fields, laws that discourages investors as well as security fears.

“Egypt has more LNG needs. We now have new LNG coming to market after we increased our LNG capacity. We are also looking at other Middle East markets to supply LNG such as Jordan and elsewhere,” Mazouzi said.

Elchin Mammadov, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence has said that Algeria, is likely to boost exports to the region in 2017 to 2018 as it increases output. The Africa’s largest gas producer also supplies Europe with both gas and LNG.

Algeria is amongst nations Egypt is discussing future LNG supplies with. Despite the fact that the country is looking to import 120 cargoes in 2017, the tender is yet to be announced. State-run oil company EGAS had signed a contract with Sonatrach for 6 LNG cargoes in 2015.

Sonatrach is increasing gas production volumes with the commencement of new projects at the aging Hassi R’Mel gas field. It is expected to sign a deal with Statoil ASA within a few weeks, Mazouzi added.

Statoil operates the In Salah and In Amenas gas fields with Sonatrach and BP.Amongst other markets, Sonatrach is considering boosting supply to Turkey, where it has a contract for 4bn cubic meters a year that will expire in 2020, Mazouzi explained.

“Turkey is one of the markets we want to supply with additional volumes of LNG,” he told Gulf Times.

Anita Fatunji