Construction began earlier this year but the contributions from international financial institutions have been delayed.

The future pipeline will stretch 1,767km (443km through Azerbaijan, 248km through Georgia and 1,076km through Turkey), will have a capacity of 50 million tonnes of oil per annum and will require 1.5 million tonnes of oil to fill it.

International creditors will cover around 70% of the costs with BP expecting to finalise deals by the end of the year. It is planned to complete construction work in the fourth quarter 2004 and to start exporting Azerbaijani oil from the port of Ceyhan in the second quarter 2005.