Managing Director of the Iranian Central Oil Fields Company (ICOFC) Salabali Karimi says Iran will keep raising crude oil production from its central fields throughout the current Iranian calendar year which began on March 20.

Speaking to Shana, Karimi said his company raised its output by 74,000 b/d in the second half of the previous calendar year to hit 180,000 b/d in March 2016 from a low of 106b/d in November 2015.

He said ICOFCs natural gas and gas condensate output was also equal to 700 million barrels of crude oil in the previous year, fetching $30b in revenues at $30/b.

The official also said his company plans to recover 20,000b/d of crude oil from Khasht Oilfield in 2017 and will be running 8 oil rigs at the field by this September from 21 rigs to reduce its costs.

Iranian Central Oil Fields Company, is one of the five major oil and gas production companies and second gas producer in the country. This company has undertaken production and development of most onshore fields of the country located in Illam, Boshehr, Charmahal-Bakhtiari, Northern Khorasan, Khozestan, Fars, Qom, Kermanshah, Kohgiloyeh-Boyerahmad, Lorestan and Hormozgan Provinces. At present the company supplies almost half of the countrys gas demand.