Soviets may halt production drop with outside funds, technologies

In a long history of Soviet oil production, a normal development progression has occurred in which several prolific oil provinces have been discovered in sequence, become dominant producers, and then declined. The present drop in Soviet oil output is partly the result of the natural decline of many of its large older fields, but also it is due to reduced capital investments in the domestic oil industry and to the reliance on outdated and inefficient exploration and development technology. This paper reports that financial and technical problems can be remedied by joint ventures with foreign oil companies. Despite these limitations, the Soviet Union has led the world in oil production ever since 1974, often by a considerable margin.