Sinopec Engineering (Group) Co Ltd provided more than 5,000 job opportunities in Kazakhstan by 2016 through joint business projects with local oil and gas company KazMunaiGas, which helped promote the transformation and upgrading of the Central Asian country's petroleum industry, company executives said.

The company, a unit of China Petrochemical Corporation, provides integrated engineering services to the domestic and overseas refining and chemical engineering market, according to its official website.

Among the 39 overseas projects carried out last year, 37 were in economies along the Belt and Road, including 12 in Saudi Arabia, two in Kazakhstan and others in Kuwait and Malaysia. The total contract value exceeded $8.59 billion, said Chen Xiaodong, general manager of the international business department at Sinopec Engineering.

The project with KazMunaiGas, a state-owned oil and gas enterprise in Kazakhstan which began in 2010, were completed in September 2016. Chen said they helped ease the country's short supply of product oil. It also produced two major raw materials in Kazakhstan-benzene and toluene.

The projects provided more than 5,000 job opportunities for local residents from 2010 to 2016. Around 16 percent of the equipment and 18 percent of materials were purchased in Kazakhstan. This, Chen said, to some extent helped promote the development of the local manufacturing industry.

The company launched another project with KazMunaiGas in 2012 to further increase the production of gasoline, diesel oil and aviation fuel oil, and also to improve processing of petroleum.

That project is part of the Kazakhstan government's plan to build a modern petrochemical base which can could produce high-quality petroleum that meets international environmental protection standards.

Chen said that so far around 80 percent of the project had been completed.

Lyu Dapeng, director of publicity department of Sinopec Group, said the project had built a complete industrial chain in the production of crude. It included design, construction, purchasing and finance and was helping to transform and upgrade the industry in Kazakhstan.

In 2016, Sinopec Engineering signed 30 new overseas projects with contracts worth a total of $1.7 billion, of which 26 will be conducted in economies along the Belt and Road.

The economies include Iran, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia and Brunei.

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