The Russian gas giant of Gazprom and the Austrian OMV company signed a Memorandum on Strategic Cooperation.
The document, signed by Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Rainer Seele, Chairman of the Executive Board of OMV, envisages the creation of a Joint Coordinating Committee on collaboration in the natural gas sector, both upstream and downstream, science and technology as well as staff training.
“Today, we continue to work toward the strengthening of Russian-Austrian relationship in the gas sector in the long term. With the newly-signed Memorandum, we will consolidate our joint activities with OMV in the areas of ongoing and potential cooperation into a single coordination center and bring it to a brand-new level,” said Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee.
“We have already been receiving reliable gas supplies from Russia for more than 50 years. Thanks to our strong partnership with Gazprom, Russia has become one of our main partner countries, and now I am delighted that we are able to take a further step together. We will continue to expand our successful existing relationship not only on an economic level, but also on a cultural and social level", said Rainer Seele, Chairman of the Executive Board of OMV.
OMV AG is Gazprom’s main partner in Austria. The companies cooperate in gas production, transportation and supplies.
On June 5, 2018, an Agreement was signed to extend until 2040 the existing contract between Gazprom Export and OMV Gas Marketing & Trading GmbH for Russian gas supplies to Austria.
The contract had been valid until 2028. June 1, 2018, marked 50 years since the start of Russian gas supplies to Austria. In 2017, Gazprom set a new record for gas exports to Austria at 9.1 billion cubic meters, a rise of 50.3 per cent (3 billion cubic meters) from 2016 (6.1 billion cubic meters) and 33.7 per cent (2.3 billion cubic meters) from 2005, when the previous record had been reached (6.8 billion cubic meters).