Since February, the Russian company LUKOIL has reduced gas production in Uzbekistan to about 40% of its design capacity due to the low demand for gas from China.

Amid falling oil prices and falling demand, the company sustained a 46 billion rubles loss, according to IFRS. At the same time, the company’s free cash flow, which serves as the basis for calculating dividends, remained positive, although it fell by 70% to 55 billion rubles, Kommersant writes.

The average daily hydrocarbon production of LUKOIL (2.4 million bpd) decreased by 1% compared to the same period last year, due to the reduction in gas supplies from Uzbekistan to China because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since February, LUKOIL has reduced gas production to 40% of its design capacity, the publication notes.

In general, LUKOIL increased its production of liquid hydrocarbons in the first quarter by 2%, to 22.1 million tons.