SHANGHAI, Dec 18: China said on Tuesday it had set up a special office to handle its strategic oil reserves that will aim to better manage and ensure the faster construction of storage facilities.

The new office will be authorised to fill and release crude as it sees fit, according to a statement posted on the website of the National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s key economic agency.

China, the world’s second largest consumer and importer of oil after the United States, intends to build a strategic oil reserve capable of holding 12m tons by 2010, the commission said.

By 2020, China hopes its reserves will be further increased to hold about 30 million tons of storage capacity, according to earlier reports.

Asia’s thirstiest consumer of crude has already invested about six billion yuan ($810m) to secure storage of 10 million tons, earlier reports said.

China, which began to build four strategic oil reserve facilities in 2004, has two sites in the eastern part of the country near Shanghai that are in operation and account for up to three million tons of oil.

When two other facilities are filled in the Liaoning and Shandong provinces, also in the east, China should be able to count on supply lasting about 30 days.

The aim of the reserve is to guarantee supply in times of need as the nation’s ongoing economic boom demands ever-more energy to fuel the factories that supply many of the world’s consumers with its manufactured goods.

A net importer of oil since 1993, China imported 138.8 million tons of crude in 2006, up 16.9 per cent from the previous year.—AFP