Mexico’s state oil monopoly Pemex awarded its first-ever private oil-field operating contracts as the company seeks to kick-start foreign investment in the nationalised energy sector.

British energy services firm Petrofac won the right to operate two of the three mature oil fields up for grabs, and Mexico’s Administradora en Proyectos de Campos (APC) won the third.

Petrofac, which designs, builds and maintains facilities used in extracting and processing oil and gas, will be the first foreign company to operate fields in the world’s No 7 oil producer in more than 70 years. The new contracts are the fruit of 2008 reforms aimed at attracting more private investment into the lumbering oil industry to bring new dynamism to the sector.

The fields total only a small fraction of Mexico’s proven reserves of 13.8 billion barrels, but Pemex is hoping strong interest in other areas, especially deep-water contracts off the Gulf of Mexico planned for next year, will help reverse a slide in production.

“This is the beginning of a new phase. We want companies to help us exploit this resource by working hand-in-hand with us,” Pemex CEO Juan Jose Suarez Coppel said after the announcement.

“With more flexible contracts ... the potential is huge,” he added at the event held in the city of Villahermosa, Tabasco, an oil-producing state on the Gulf coast.

More than 50 companies bought information packets about the Carrizo, Magallanes and Santuario fields in southern Mexico to get a peak at Pemex plans, twenty-seven made bids but only 17 fulfilled all the requirements. Even companies that did not win the contracts said they were pleased with the process. “This was a good start for Pemex ... we are hoping this will open doors for more companies to exploit these reserves that have been passed over,” said Manuel del Villar, the director of GPA Energy, which submitted a losing bid for the Santuario area.

“This is the first round, there will be others and we learned lessons,” he said.