Teaming up with US-based Hunt Oil, FAR has taken 30% stakes in three blocks off the coast of Senegal that it claims offer potential for world-class oil accumulations.

In late March, the joint venture wrapped up a 2050 square kilometre $17.8 million 3D seismic program over the blocks – the largest such campaign in Senegal’s history.

FAR chairman Michael Evans said the northwest African margin was relatively under-explored but it had numerous recent, sizeable and intriguing discoveries, including the Woodside-operated Chinguetti and Tiof discoveries in adjacent Mauritania.

FAR’s own acreage, the Sangomar-Rufisque offshore licence, covers an area of 14,981sq.km over the shelf, slope and basin floor.

“Large closures have been identified at the Aptian carbonate and Cenomanian sandstone levels, along with numerous Senonian stratigraphic leads,” Evans said. “Upside potential within the licence exceeds 1 billion barrels recoverable.”

If these assets take off, FAR could follow in the footsteps of Hardman, according to Evans.

“If you look at the companies operating along this part of the West African coastline, FAR is an anomaly,” he said.

“We have a very small market cap [about $50 million] compared to the other players. The nearest other company would be around $2 billion.”

A report by broker and analyst Hartleys said FAR was the only ASX-listed junior oil and gas company with exposure to the offshore West African margin and was surrounded by several major oil and gas companies including Woodside, Edison Gas and Dana Petroleum, as well as Tullow Oil, which took over Hardman late last year.

“We believe as activity in West Africa continues to accelerate, FAR will be recognised for its strategic position and will have the opportunity to become a significant company in much the same way as Hardman achieved before being taken over by Tullow,” the report said.

But it will take years in Senegal to achieve exploration success then convert that to production, so FAR has also built up a suite of assets in Australia, the US and most recently, China.

The Australian assets – WA254-P in the Carnarvon Basin (10.7% interest, operated by Apache Energy) and EP-104 in the Canning Basin (8%, Arc Energy) – have secured a place in the company’s portfolio due to their “obvious but as yet unrealised value”, according to Evans.

WA254-P in particular, is located along the Rosemary fault trend and is, according to Evans, “too good to give up”.

Across the Pacific, FAR’s most significant US Gulf Coast opportunity to date has been in Texas where it holds a 34% working interest in the onshore NE Waller project with Amadeus Energy (30%).

The partners are currently planning a 3D seismic shoot over 80sq.km in Waller County to evaluate structural leads generated by subsurface mapping and evaluation of 2D seismic acquired during the 1980s.

Although Evans expects potential reserves to be more than 50 billion cubic feet of gas equivalent from the primary objectives alone, he said it may not be enough to satiate the appetite of hungry investors.

“Oil and gas investors in general have been spoiled a little by companies like Hardman, which made lots of money for them very quickly,” he said.

“Now they are all looking for a serious home run and small companies like ours can really only get that magnitude of growth with very large international exploration plays.

“You would not typically get that sort of result from the types of project we are doing in the US which are very mature and much lower risk.”

Adding pace to the FAR journey has been the company’s foray into China, where it holds a 5% working interest in offshore Beibu Block 22/12 under its subsidiary Oil Australia.

Beibu made headlines in 2006 when operator Roc Oil reported encouraging results from a second sidetrack well drilled at the Wei 6-12S-1 discovery, adding to speculation at the time that the field may be commercially viable.

Now, feasibility studies are well underway to determine whether development will go ahead for a 2009 start-up.

“This is a very meaningful discovery,” he said.

“A go-ahead will demonstrate our ability to get involved in a project from discovery through to development. And it will help re-rate us in the eyes of the investment and oil and gas community.”