The Ministry of Electricity and Energy of Myanmar has recently announced that it has decided to hold its offshore oil and gas production tenders, that are expected to bring new investments in this sector. The Director of the Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise’s (MOGE), confirmed that new tenders will be floating before the year end. According to reports, there are currently 51 offshore and 53 onshore blocks in Myanmar, and amongst them 38 offshore and 35 onshore blocks fall under the category where production and exploration activities are been carried out. The state-owned MOGE said that it is planning to hold tenders for the remaining free blocks. MOGE officials unveiled that the tenders for the free blocks will be kept open to local as well as foreign companies that are interested to carry out exploration & production activities at the existing wells. MOGE will also be encouraging the foreign investors to partner with the local firms, thereby ensuring that the domestic players benefit from foreign oil & gas production and exploration technologies. Daw Khin Htay, the Director of MOGE was quoted saying that the ministry will be revising and easing its regulations by removing its existing rule of it being mandatory for foreign firms to form JVs with local firms. Instead the ministry will be replacing it as a voluntary step in future. If reports are to be believed, MOEE’s (Ministry of Electricity and Energy) attempt to make local firms register their interest in foreign firms failed because the new developments were brought at a time when existing wells had noticed a rapid decline in their production level. Â So far, zero registrations have been made. According to Daw Khin Htay, companies could be taking time to make essential preparation as no specific deadline is been made for registration. For the record, in 2011, 146 Myanmar firms had registered with MOEE during its last tender round.