Desarrollo energético en América Latina y la economía mundial

E/rain Friedmann I W'ORLD BANK LENDING FOR HYDROCARBONS: A ... Before describing its elements, 1 will discuss the rationale that led the World Bank to device this ambitious programo Following the dramatic increases in petroleum prices of 1973 and 1974, the Bank began to review its lending policies for energy development. Cle:arIy, after these price increases took place, the economics of energy pro– duction have changed radically. On the one hand, the price makes the exploitation of previously uneconomic resources commercially viable. On the other, it has raised the cost oI importing oil to a point where many developing countries acutely need assistance to organize and finance programs to reduce their dependence. Forty eight of the 74 larger developing countries that import oil depend on it for at least 90% OI their commercial energy requirements. Oil imports of developing countries as a group have increased tenfold from 4 billion dollars in 1972 to 42 billion dollars estimated for 1980. This would account on average for about 20% of their export earnings. Although oil production is projected to increase in these countries at a faster liate than consumption (8.9% vS. 5.2% annually) the absolute deficit will continue to grow. It should be noted that many developing coun– tries are passing through the energy intensive phase that the developed countries experienced during their time oI rapid industrialization and urban growth. Unless energy deficits can be narrowed by exploi– ting indigenuous sources oI energy more ful1y, the scarce foreign exchange of these developing countries will need to be diverted to imports that would otherwise be available for investment goods. In 1975, the World Bank commissioned a study to determine the oil and gas prospects for 70 developing countries. Twelve of these coun– tries were oil producers but net importers, three were non-OPEC pro– ducers and marginal exporters, and 55 were non-producers, of which ten had known reserves. Only ten oI these 70 countries were found to be adequately explored, and 38, inadequately. Twenty-three coun. tries were judged to have relatively high2 prospects of finding viable petroleum resources (over 750 million barrels) and 15 were judged to have fair prospects (between 100 and 750 million barreIs). Of the 23 countries that were judged to have rel;atively high prospects of finding viable petroleum resources, only seven have been explored adequately, six have been explored moderately; and the rest, inade– quately. Clearly, the cost o·f exploration may be several times as much in a developing country as in the United States, since the reserves are "In this cases it really means high compared with domestic requirements of most LDes rather than with other oH producing countries. . 161