THE quadrupling of oil prices within a few months in late 1973 and early
1974 brought to an abrupt end the era of inexpensive oil. Since then the
continuing increases in the price of oil traded in the international
market and the higher prices of imports of manu- factured goods have
seriously disrupted the foreign exchange balances of many developing
countries and forced them to replan their development programmes. The
impact of high oil prices is felt in every country, whether developed or
developing, and has brought to world attention the fact that not only
are petroleum resources in limited supply and exhaustible but also that
substitutes cannot be found easily or quickly. In a world faced with the
certainty of declining supplies of petroleum there is widespread
interest and concern among all the oil producing countries to evaluate
the extent of their petroleum resources and to examine more closely the
problems of their development, rates of depletion and methods of
conservation. The present work reviews some of the above issues and
problems in relation to Indonesia, an OPEC member, and the major oil
producing country in South-East Asia. More specifically, it seeks to
provide the reader with an overview of the petroleum resources of the
country- their nature, extent, distribution as well as the problems of
their development.