Ecuador: Public opposition forces cancellation of licensing round

THE GOVERNMENT has cancelled a licensing round for four Amazon basin fields, because of unresolved legal matters. Last month, the energy minister, Eduardo Lopez, said the process will be reopened when outstanding legal issues have been resolved, but no date has been set. Nathan Piper, an Ecuador analyst at Wood Mackenzie, the oil and gas consultancy, says this could take up to a year. The cancellation follows an outburst of public opposition to the government's decision to sweeten the contract terms. Six companies—EnCana, Eni, Occidental, Perenco, Petrobras and Repsol YPF—had complained that the original terms were too harsh, prompting President Lucio Gutiérrez to revise them in their favour