Phnom Penh - Oil could turn Cambodia into Asia's Norway, a UN-sponsored conference to discuss strategies to deal with the country's expected offshore petroleum reserves heard Wednesday. Bangkok-based Norwegian ambassador extraordinary Merete Fjeld Brattested told the international conference aimed at discussing how to use the as-yet untapped reserves to fuel poverty reduction said Norway had once been the poor cousin of Europe.
"When oil was discovered off the Norwegian coast in the 1960's, Norway was blessed," she said.
Now oil and gas revenue makes up about 15 per cent of the Norwegian government's income and has brought prosperity, she said, but not without the Norwegian government facing difficult decisions about how to distribute and calculate that wealth.
The three-day conference, co-sponsored by Norway, aims to head off donor concerns that the recently discovered and unestimated oil reserves may prove a curse rather than a blessing for Cambodia, which is notorious for endemic corruption.
Cambodian officials have said they expect drilling to begin between 2009 and 2011.
Deputy Prime Minister Sok An told the meeting that Cambodia needed to work out strategies to fit its own unique circumstances, but that it welcomed input from other oil producing countries.
"Not all objectives are reasonable for all countries," he said. "No single mechanism is likely to provide a silver bullet; oil producing and oil exporting countries need to use a combination of approaches."
He warned that the foreign fixation on oil revenue should not overshadow the government's efforts at reform in all areas across the board.
Prime Minister Hun Sen, who declined to attend and sent Sok An in his place, has expressed frequent public annoyance at donor criticism of Cambodian oil management before any oil has even been tapped.
The director of the Cambodian National Petroleum Authority, Te Duong Tara, echoed Sok An's sentiments, but added that Cambodia's lack of qualified and skilled personnel to work on oil production was also a pressing concern.
"The key challenge facing Cambodia is therefore to attract the investment necessary to develop the energy, gas development and resource sectors of its economy in a timely and efficient manner," he said.
The conference is scheduled to end Friday.
