Relations between Turkmenistan and China are long-term and strategic.  “These relations stood the test of time, proven their efficiency and now are a major factor of stability and development in the Eurasian space,” President Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov said in an interview before his official visit to Beijing.
  In December 2009 Turkmenistan-China gas pipeline was commissioned. “This is an outstanding event. This project is of strategic importance for both sides, meets long-term interests of Turkmenistan and China, as well as logic of global economic development, in which energy supplies play an increasing role,” Berdimuhammadov told Chinese journalists.
 The Turkmen leader stressed that Ashgabat jointly with Chinese partners is working on further increase in the supply of Turkmen gas to Beijing in view of increasing demands in China’s economy and great opportunities of Turkmenistan’s resource base.  “China is not just a huge and great country, a powerful global economic and industrial centre, a vast and promising market for Turkmenistan. It is a reliable and trusted friend,” Berdimuhammadov highlighted.
 At the same time China is ready to work with Turkmenistan to create a good environment for their business cooperation. Cooperation between the two countries has seen achievement in economic, trade, energy, transportation and other fields in recent years, Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qishan told at a business forum.
 In last weeks Ashgabat issued an angry response to Russian scepticism over the size of its natural gas reserves and reinforced its ambition to find new energy markets in Asia and Europe that will cut its dependence on the Kremlin. BP data ranks natural gas reserves in Turkmenistan, a Central Asian nation of 5.4 million, as the world’s fourth-largest. The country is seeking alternative export routes to meet its goal of more than tripling natural gas output by 2030. 
 Auditor Gaffney, Cline & Associates has ranked the South Iolotan natural gas field as the world’s second-largest after South Pars in Iran, saying last month it could contain between 13.1 trillion and 21.2 trillion cubic metres. But Alexander Medvedev, deputy chief executive of Russian gas export monopoly Gazprom, called these estimates into question. “I believe that there are no grounds … and no reason to make such statements that there is such a natural deposit with reserves of this scale,” Medvedev said.
 Ashgabat, at odds with Moscow over its plans to export gas to Europe, issued a strongly worded statement, expressing “bewilderment over the biased assessment by a professional” and calling Gazprom‘s remarks “utterly tactless”.  Turkmenistan has expanded gas exports to next-door Iran and launched a pipeline to China. It has also won strong support from the European Union and the United States for plans to supply gas to a trans-Caspian pipeline that will run to Europe via Azerbaijan.
 Turkmenistan’s annual natural gas output is estimated to have averaged around 70 billion cubic metres in the 20 years of independence from the Soviet Union. Turkmenistan aims to produce 230 bcm of the fuel annually by 2030.

(Sources – Xinhua, Reuters, Trend)