Nido told the market that the delay was the result of technical issues while completing the Galoc-3 development well, which have since been resolved.

“Following the delay caused to the project during the Galoc-3 completion installation, the project is slightly behind the anticipated schedule,” the company said.

“However, the impact has been minimised by the operator and Nido’s current expectation is for first oil to the FPSO between March 28 and April 18.”

As planned, the Galoc-3 has been temporarily plugged to allow work to begin on completing the Galoc-4 well.

Following this operation, flow-testing will occur on the two wells, which are targeting 23.5 million barrels of proved and probable (2P) reserves as certified by Gaffney, Cline and Associates.

Nido, which has a 23% stake in Galoc, will be entitled to about 4000 barrels of oil per day once production starts in the first quarter of 2008.

Otto has received its stake in the project via the acquisition of a 31.38% shareholding in Galoc Production Company, which is operator and holds a 58.29% stake in the development in offshore Palawan Basin service contract SC14C.

Other members of the consortium are Alcorn Gold Resources, Forum Energy, Oriental Petroleum, PetroEnergy Resources and Philodrill.