Indonesia’s largest oil and gas company, Pertamina, received its first shipment of liquefied petroleum gas from Iran last week, and is exploring options for the development of two oil fields in Iran, which is eager to attract foreign investors following the lifting of international sanctions.

The tanker, carrying 44,000 tonnes of LPG, arrived at a port in Situbondo, in Indonesia’s East Java Province. It left from the Iranian port of Assaluyeh two weeks earlier. This is the first shipment of LPG out of a total 600,000 tonnes that Pertamina has agreed to buy from the National Iranian Oil Company in a contract signed in May for deliveries this year and next.

"This marks a new chapter in the Pertamina-NIOC partnership and is paving way for more significant trade cooperation between Indonesia and Iran," Pertamina President Dwi Soetjipto said as he welcomed the tanker at the Indonesian port.

Pertamina said it made the purchase to meet Indonesia’s growing need for LPG, which is expected to grow 13.6 per cent this year to 7.5 million tonnes. Pertamina and NIOC have also signed a separate agreement to conduct preliminary studies on two giant oil fields in Iran, Ab-Teymour and Mansouri, which together have an estimated reserves of 5 million barrels of crude.

The deals between the two state-run companies were made after the Indonesian and Iranian governments signed a memorandum of understanding covering the energy sector in February, a month after international sanctions against Iran over its nuclear activities were lifted.