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ALGIERS, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Algerian state-run energy group Sonatrach, Africa's biggest company by revenue, made $76 billion from oil and gas sales in 2008, the firm's chief executive said, up from $57 billion the previous year.
"We reached $76 billion," Sonatrach's CEO Mohamed Meziane told reporters, without saying how much Sonatrach's foreign partners earned from their operations in the North African country.
Sonatrach earned $57 billion in 2007 from producing and selling oil and gas, while the state earned a further $2 billion from a windfall tax on the earnings of foreign energy firms operating in Algeria.
British Petroleum, Amerada Hess, Statoil, Anadarko Petroleum Corp., Repsol and Total are the main foreign companies involved in the exploration and production of hydrocarbons in Algeria.
OPEC-member Algeria is the world's 15th-biggest oil reserves owner and a major gas supplier to Europe. On Saturday it signed deals worth $272 million with four foreign companies to explore for oil and gas. (Reporting by Hamid Ould Ahmed; editing by Tom Pfeiffer)