Asia has, for long, been recognized as the emerging energy hub. An aggressive contender for global hydrocarbons reserves, the region has significant reserves of its own. These factors are leading to Asia’s evolution as a dynamic marketplace for hydrocarbons, particularly natural gas.

Being the clean fuel option offering environmental benefits, greater efficiency and cost effectiveness, natural gas is becoming the preferred fuel for future. The recent discoveries in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, China & India have taken the natural gas reserves northwards. In response, the energy hungry nations including China, South Korea, India and Japan are expected to drive growth with China and India engaged in bulk gas trades in the coming years. However, there still exists a wide gap between demand and supply of natural gas in the region and a number of factors have been playing important role in the evolution of this marketplace. These include the geopolitical situations, gas supply networks, long-term gas sourcing contracts with reserve rich regions/countries, technology advancements, financing options, alternate fuels etc among others.

With the immense opportunities for business, there is also a set of challenges for this emerging market. With a view to facilitate an interactive platform to identify opportunities, understand challenges and find solutions, GAIL (India) Limited and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) with the support of International Gas Union (IGU) conceptualized Asia Gas Partnership Summit (AGPS).

Over past five editions, AGPS has successfully brought together the global gas industry to discuss and deliberate issues pertinent to evolution of gas markets in the region. The current edition, Asia Gas PartnershipSummit - 2010 scheduled for March 22-23, 2010 at Taj Palace Hotel, New Delhi, has been built around the theme: Sourcing, Transmission and Distribution of Natural Gas : Challenges for Emerging Markets.