June 20, 2025 [Oil Price]- Zhongman Petroleum and Natural Gas Group (ZPEC), an independent Shanghai-listed Chinese oil and gas company, has won a licensing contract to explore a natural gas block in central Algeria, the firm has said.

Algeria’s National Agency for the Valorization of Hydrocarbon Resources, ALNAFT, has awarded the Chinese firm an exploration contract for the Zerafa II gas block. 

ZPEC won the block in competition with French supermajor TotalEnergies and a consortium of two other European oil firms, Italian Eni and Norway’s Equinor, the Chinese company said, as quoted by Reuters. 

The Zerafa II block is in the southern part of Algeria’s main gas-bearing basin, Gourara-Timimoun. 

In the same Algerian tender, TotalEnergies and QatarEnergy have secured the Ahara oil and gas license in the country’s first licensing round under a new hydrocarbons law issued in December 2019. The Ahara block spans nearly 14,900 square kilometers at the junction of the Berkine and Illizi basins.

The award marks a strategic expansion for both firms in North Africa. 

TotalEnergies will operate during the exploration and appraisal phases with a 24.5% interest, mirrored by QatarEnergy. Algeria’s national oil company, Sonatrach, holds the majority 51% stake, as required by law.

“We are delighted to be awarded the Ahara Block, which marks our first entry into Algeria’s upstream sector and further and expands our footprint in Africa,” QatarEnergy’s president and chief executive officer, Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi, said.

Algeria, which joined OPEC in 1969, produces around 900,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil currently. The North African producer is part of the OPEC+ agreement looking to manage oil supply to the market. 

In recent months, Algeria has been vying to monetize its natural gas resources, especially in exports to Europe, which now has to do without much of the pipeline Russian gas it was consuming before 2022.