— China and Turkmenistan are important players in the international energy market. Our countries have a huge potential for cooperation, which is of deep strategic importance, said the President of the Chinese National Oil and Gas Corporation (CNPC) Hou Qijun, speaking on Wednesday at the plenary session of the International Conference «Oil and Gas of Turkmenistan 2023».

The head of CNPC called on Turkmen partners to actively develop cooperation in the gas sector and create new growth points in the energy field.

– Thanks to the strategic leadership of the heads of the two countries, gas cooperation has achieved fruitful results in areas such as exploration and production, natural gas trade, engineering construction, maintenance, equipment and materials supply, green low-carbon development, personnel training, - said How Qijun.

According to him, as of September 2023, the volume of natural gas trade between China and Turkmenistan exceeded 380 billion cubic meters with a trade turnover of $76 billion. China has been the largest trading partner of Turkmenistan for 12 years in a row, and Turkmenistan is the largest exporter of pipeline gas to China, the President of CNPC emphasized.

Speaking about the prospects for cooperation for the future, Hou Qijun expressed the willingness to implement together with Turkmen partners important agreements reached by the heads of the two states, take full advantage of the CNPC in finance and technology, the market, the possibility of building and operating transnational pipelines, to create Closer energy partnership to contribute more to the socio-economic development of the two countries.

– In the future, CNPC is interested in continuing to strengthen cooperation with Turkmen counterparts, especially in areas such as natural gas and new energy, green low-carbon investments, industrialization of carbon gas capture technologies, - Hou noted in his speech Qijun.

He also said that CNPC is ready to discuss with Turkmenistan a partnership in gas business planning, bioenergy, electrification of transport, hydrogen energy, etc. Hou Qijun added that CNPC attaches great importance to the training of local specialists in Turkmenistan.

For 16 years, 56,000 Turkmen employees were trained, and 139 citizens were selected to study at the universities of the PRC.