Iraq’s Oil Ministry will hold a workshop in Istanbul for its second oil licensing round on 18-19 October.

It will send the terms of the contracts for the new round to oil majors in the first week of October.

The ministry’s Petroleum Contracts & Licensing Directorate has invited 45 qualified oil companies to attend the workshop. It aims to reverse the disappointing results of the first bid round held in June, according to an international oil company executive close to the deal.

The directorate is offering licences covering 10 oil and gas fields which have yet to be developed.

The fields include the highly prized Majnoon field in Basra Province and West Qurna phase 2, which holds about six billion barrels of oil.

The remaining fields include Halfaya, East Baghdad, Gharraf, Qavara, Najmah, Badrah and Merjan/Kifl/West Kifl.

Iraq is also offering an Eastern Block comprising the Gilabat, Khashm al-Ahmr, Nau Doman and Qumar fields.

Bids are due by early December and Iraq wants to sign contracts by the end of 2009.

The government says the fields are capable of producing up to 2.5 million barrels a day (b/d) of oil by 2013.

In June’s licensing round, the ministry awarded just one licence to an energy major as companies baulked at Baghdad’s tough terms and conditions.