Latest data from the Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKKMigas) show that upstream exploration activities are not expected to reach the year-end targets once again.

Between January and August, only 10, or 22 percent, of the planned 45 two-dimensional and three-dimensional seismic surveys for exploration had been conducted, according to the data.

During the same period, only 29 percent of 138 exploration wells under companies’ work plans and budgets this year were actually drilled.

The task force expects that there will be only one additional seismic survey and four wells completed by the end of this year.

More non-seismic surveys have been completed in comparison, with 11 out of 16 surveys done so far. However, SKKMigas does not expect to reach its target in this category either by year-end.

Lengthy land acquisition was one of the main reasons why many investors were not able to complete exploration commitments in their annual work plans and budgets, said Deputy Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Archandra Tahar.

“Even though they have every intention of fulfilling their commitments, sometimes they find that they cannot acquire the land they need,” he said recently.

Lack of readily available open data was another reason for some investors being hesitant to pour their cash into exploration activities, he added.

Arcandra said he would discuss with SKKMigas expanding the agency’s role in a bid to help ease land-acquisition processes under existing regulations.

While the government has set a modest target of US$940 million in exploration blocks by the end of 2017, it only achieved $30 million by the first half of this year, SKKMigas data show.

Last year, only $800 million was invested, compared to $1.3 billion in 2012.

Exploration in Indonesia’s upstream oil and gas sector reached its peak in 2011 but only started drastically falling from 2014, when global crude oil prices plunged below the $30 per barrel mark.

While oil prices have slowly climbed back up again, they have not risen by as much as many initially hoped for at the beginning of the year. Benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) traded at $51.55 per barrel on Monday, while fellow benchmark Brent was set at $56.58 in the same period.

The need for more exploration and development is especially urgent because of Indonesia’s depleting reserves.

Official data show that the amount of proven crude oil reserves in the country had dropped to 3.3 billion barrels at the end of last year from 3.69 billion in 2013.

Moreover, proven gas reserves only reached 101 trillion cubic feet (tcf) in 2016 from 102 tcf three years before.

Even so, the government remains optimistic as it recently introduced a revised regulation on a new gross-split production sharing contract (PSC) scheme.

The revised regulation, as set out in Energy and Mineral Resources Ministerial Decree No. 52/2017, has now added some incentives for exploration activities under the scheme.

The gross split scheme now allows additional profit schemes for investors developing blocks under a plan of development (POD) II, which was previously only reserved for blocks under the first POD.

Experts pointed out that the root of exploration woes lay in the government’s lack of certainty, with its flip-flopping policies and an absence of guaranteed economic feasibility.

“Uncertain policies will spill over into uncertainty over economic feasibility, low quality data and lengthy permits and red tape, [which all leads to] increasing difficulties in exploring our remaining potential oil and gas reserves,” said ReforMiner Institute founder Pri Agung Rakhmanto on Monday.

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