JAKARTA Indonesia's largest crude oil producer, PT Caltex Pacific Indonesia, is losing 30,000 barrels per day (bpd) in production because of strikes and demonstrations at the company's fields, AFP quoted a minister as saying Tuesday.
Minister for Energy and Mineral Resources Purnomo Yusgiantoro said the strikes had lopped the 30,000 barrels of Caltex's normal output of 650,000 bpd in the Riau area of Sumatra Island.
"Because there have been security disturbances, strikes and demonstrations (in the oil field area), its production has declined by more or less 30,000 bpd," Yusgiantoro said at a hearing with a lower house commission.
He said the decline in daily production in Caltex oil production, which currently provides 50 percent of national production, would ultimately impact on government revenue via oil revenue exports proceeds.
Yusgiantoro declined to elaborate further, saying only that the government was making efforts to secure the area in Riau and prevent the disturbances from spreading to other regions.
Reports from Riau have said most of the protests in the form of blockades of work sites involved locals demanding jobs at Caltex operations.