One more month for the Yasuni ITT initiative

The Government set the deadline for the evaluation on the exploitation of the Ishpingo, Tambococha and Tiputini (ITT) oil fields a month from today, after a meeting which took place at Carondelet between representatives of the initiative and authorities of the oil sector.

The meeting was attended by the managers of Petroecuador, Marco Calvopina and Petroamazonas, Osvaldo Madrid, the Minister of strategic sectors, Rafael Poveda, among other officials.

Deputy Minister of communication, Patricio Barriga, read a statement at the end of the meeting and pointed out that the objective is still leaving the oil in the ground, although the expected amount has nos been collected, while in June, the Yasuní-ITT initiative, which provides to leave 920 million barrels of oil in the ground, turned six years.

The purpose of the project was to ensure that the international community recognize to Ecuador close to USD 3 billion in Exchange for not exploiting crude oil which is located in the bowels of the Yasuní National Park,

However, Ivonne Baki, negotiating head of the initiative, indicated that only they have raised USD 364 million, taking into account the money deposited in the trust of the United Nations program for development (USD 7 million).

If the final decision of the Ecuadorian Government is to carry out the so-called ‘Plan B’ which consists of exploiting the axis Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini (ITT) the delivery of the first barrel of oil would take between three and five years.