Key lubricants market 'set to bounce back'
Manama, May 10, 2012
The essential oils and lubricants market is likely to bounce back to its 2010 level by 2016, said Dr Abdulhussain Mirza, Bahrain’s Energy Minister.
He was speaking at the opening of the first Middle East Conference for Base Oil and Lubes 2012 at the Ritz-Carlton Bahrain Hotel and Spa yesterday.
The conference, whose theme is "Opportunities and Challenges for the Essential Oils and Lubricants Manufacturing Industry and Future Prospects," was organised by Conference Connection and Petrosil in collaboration with the National Oil and Gas Authority.
More than 150 senior industry experts from 16 countries were taking part in the two-day event to exchange information and scientific expertise and to work on developing participants' practical and vocational skills.
The minister expressed his delight that the organisers had chosen Bahrain for the world-class event.
He said that in 2011, Bahrain had inaugurated the essential oils and lubricants production project owned by the Bahrain Basic Oils and Lubricants Company at a total cost of $430 million.
He said that in the current market situation and in view of limited resources, technical and marketing risks should be reduced but not overlooked.
One method to achieve this ambition was to form strategic alliances in which companies synergistically rely on their points of strength.
Regarding the essential oils and lubricants factory in Bahrain, he said the Finnish company Neste Oil provided technical know-how from the Neste-Jacobs Group, and operational expertise from Borvo Refinery in Finland in addition to its own marketing experience gained through its global operations.
Bahrain committed highly qualified manpower and a plot of land located in the vicinity of the refinery and export facilities for the project, he said.
He said the project was implemented with employees from 12 nationalities who spoke 20 languages and was completed within the allocated budget and specified timetable and had a record of 10 million hours of operation without any time-wasting incident. – TradeArabia News Service
