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Oil could transform one of the world’s smallest nations, Seychelles,
into one of the richest, according to Surya Khanna, the managing director
of Seychelles National Oil Company (SNOC). Three Western oil companies are
carrying out seismic studies in the waters of Seychelles, a large group
of islands in the western Indian Ocean. ‘I rate the chances of finding oil
as good,’ says Khanna.

Next year, Enterprise Oil, an independent British oil company, plans
to drill a well beneath the seabed at an unspecified location, probably
off the coral island of Coetivy. The geological signs, it says, are ‘very
encouraging’. Texaco and Ultramar have also been granted exploration licences
by the Seychelles’ government. Their activities are being ‘coordinated and
monitored’ by SNOC.

The discovery of oil could solve Seychelles’ economic problems at a
stroke. Oil represents 26 per cent of Seychelles imports, and the country
is almost wholly dependent on petroleum for its energy needs. Seychelles
was particularly badly hit by the Gulf crisis, which cut off the flow of
tourists, the country’s main source of the foreign exchange with which it
buys imports.

According to Khanna, once production had begun, Seychelles would overnight
become an oil exporting nation. This is because its domestic consumption
is so small, peaking at just 1400 barrels a day. ‘Maybe one hour’s production
would be enough to serve our daily needs,’ he says.

Seychelles’ population is about 70 000. The per capita income is $2600,
putting Seychelles among ‘middle income’ countries.

In the long run, says Khanna, the Seychelles government could end up
with as much as 77 per cent of any oil revenue. He cautions, however, that
it will probably take five years from discovery of oil to full production.

Seychelles is a group of 115 islands spread across an area of 1.15 million
square kilometres. The ‘outer’, low-lying islands are all sand cays or coral
islands, whereas the ‘inner’ islands are high and made of granite. Most
of the population is concentrated on the granitic islands, principally Mahe.

Oil companies became interested in Seychelles because of ‘surface seeps’
of tar balls on the beaches of Coetivy, a coral island 290 kilometres south
of Mahe. In oil parlance, the islands are a ‘frontier area’, essentially
unexplored but possessing all the geological structures necessary for oil.

Oil is formed when organic material is ‘cooked’ in deep layers of sedimentary
rock. ‘In places,’ says Khanna, ‘the granite here is topped by sedimentary
rock that is 8 kilo metres deep.’

The high granitic islands of Seychelles are the mountain tops of a submerged
‘micro continent’, once part of the supercontinent known as Gondwanaland.
During the last ice age, when most of the world’s water was locked up in
ice, the land mass was about 300 times as large as today.

The oil companies are exploring near the edge of the granitic mass of
Seychelles where the seabed drops precipitously to oceanic crust, and also
near banks submerged in the Indian Ocean. Texaco has a licence to explore
on the southern shelf, while Ultramar has the concession to the northeast
of Mahe. Enterprise’s licence is for the southeastern edge of the granitic
shelf, but it is also exploring the seabed around Fortune Bank, to the south,
and the coral islands of Ile Platte and Coetivy.

All exploration is taking place in water less than 200 metres deep,
the limit of present ocean-drilling technology, says Khanna. This encompasses
an area of 60 000 square kilometres. ‘As yet, however, we have little idea
of the quality of any oil, nor any estimate of the size of any reserves.’

Amoco alone spent $45 million between 1977 and 1986. It drilled three
dry wells on the western shelf, which according to SNOC, ‘indicated the
presence of all the elements necessary for the existence of hydrocarbons’.

The potential for transforming Seychelles’ economy may be great, but
so, too, is the potential for environmental damage. Seychelles is the home
of huge numbers of birds, including some of the rarest in the world. The
granitic island of Aride, for example, boasts the world’s largest colony
of lesser noddies, and probably also of roseate terns.

Khanna says that environmental damage will be avoided by shipping crude
oil out directly. ‘There are no plans to bring any ashore to be refined,’
he says. Platforms could be joined to a central terminal to which tankers
are moored.