everybody you met, to nowadays where you can often be on a bus or a plane and you do not know anybody. ?We have also become a much more outgoing community and I think for the better of it. People have been [...] important to get the best deal possible. He said: ?Nobody was particular keen to have oil here because we had lived a certain kind of lifestyle for many years and oil seemed to be too disruptive to be good [...] been actually come to live in Shetland, build their homes and have their families here. They are a bonus to the islands, I believe.?

together in the West of Shetland,? said a senior BP executive. ?We are much more realistic about what we need to do. We will be drilling in 2004 and are currently struggling to find the right place to drill [...] round at a later date, said a government oil and gas official. ?We included acreage close to the Faeroes in the 19th licence round. We need to do more environmental work in the area before we can open acreage [...] not taken up in the previous 20th round and a batch of assets in the gas prone southern North Sea basin. Acreage in the West of Shetlands and east of the Faeroes Islands will be included in a single round

their contractors have to turn their focus towards a new market to find out what that particular market has to offer. This stipulation also commits the local business community which has to be on its feet marketing [...] whole have been carried out in a satisfactory manner. However I still think that this conference is a good forum for dialog between the parties involved, as they from time to time might seem to have opposite [...] privilege to open the first Offshore Faroes conference, and I am honoured to be invited back this year. Last year we were on the brink of a new industry in the Faroese context. Today we have three exploration

was to benefit from a massive oil boom. To taste a flavour of the mood in the islands, look no further than the film Local Hero, a huge hit in Britain when it opened in cinemas across the country in 1983 [...] whole. They have funded many economic and social projects and continue to do so. A new cheese factory is about to open and work will soon begin on a modern new library in the Orkney capital, Kirkwall. Funding [...] Danny might not be rich. But he is happy to acknowledge that the plant and its staff been excellent neighbours - and have made a huge contribution to the present prosperity of Orkney as a whole. The wealth