The N.L.A.M. (Nederlandsche Lloyd Aardolie Maatschappij, “Netherlands Lloyd Petroleum Company”) was a Dutch oil company that, in the 1940–1941 period, operated the Peureula and South Perlak fields of the Atjeh oil complex on Atjeh territory. The N.L.A.M.’s 1940 production from the Peureula field (48,219 tons) made it, after the B.P.M.-operated Tamiang block, the second-largest producing operator of the Atjeh oil fields in that year, and the N.L.A.M. accordingly represents the principal non-B.P.M., non-American presence in the colonial Atjeh oil industry.
Operations on Atjeh territory
The N.L.A.M. is recorded in Van Bemmelen’s *Geology of Indonesia* (1949) Table 4 as the operator of two of the four component fields of the Atjeh oil complex:
- The Peureula field (48,219 tons in 1940, 36,640 tons in 1941) — by a wide margin the largest producing field of the Atjeh oil complex.
- The South Perlak field (no production in either 1940 or 1941).
The Peureula field’s production of 48,219 tons in 1940 makes the N.L.A.M. the operator of the largest producing Atjeh-complex field, and the decline to 36,640 tons in 1941 (–24.0 %) is consistent with the general contraction of East Indian oil production in 1941 as the colonial economy braced for the Pacific War. The South Perlak field’s non-production in either year is shared with the Pulu Pandjang field (operated by the N.K.P.M.), and the two together are the only Atjeh-complex fields with zero recorded production in either year.
Place in the Atjeh oil economy
The N.L.A.M. occupies a distinctive place in the colonial Atjeh oil economy. Unlike the B.P.M. (Royal Dutch), the N.K.P.M. (Standard Oil of New Jersey) and the N.P.P.M. (Standard Oil of California), the N.L.A.M. is not identified by Van Bemmelen as a subsidiary of a major international oil company. The name “Nederlandsche Lloyd” suggests an affiliation with the Netherlands Lloyd shipping or insurance group, and the N.L.A.M. is accordingly best understood as an independent Dutch oil company — one of the smaller East Indian oil concerns that, like the “Borneo Oil Company” mentioned by Van Bemmelen as a Japanese concern, occupied the niches of the East Indian oil industry not controlled by the three major international groups.
The N.L.A.M.’s operation of the largest producing Atjeh-complex field (Peureula) accordingly represents the most substantial independent-Dutch presence in the colonial Atjeh oil industry, and the company’s presence on Atjeh territory is the documentary evidence that the Atjeh oil complex was divided among three different oil companies — the N.L.A.M. (Peureula, South Perlak), the N.K.P.M. (Pulu Pandjang) and the N.P.P.M. (Pasé) — rather than being controlled by a single major operator.
Significance
The N.L.A.M. is significant for the encyclopedia of Acheh history because it was the operator of the largest producing field of the Atjeh oil complex — the Peureula field, with 48,219 tons in 1940 and 36,640 tons in 1941 — and accordingly the principal non-B.P.M., non-American presence in the colonial Atjeh oil industry. The N.L.A.M.’s operation of the Peureula and South Perlak fields is the documentary evidence that the Atjeh oil complex was divided among three different oil companies (the N.L.A.M., the N.K.P.M. and the N.P.P.M.), and accordingly that the Atjeh oil landscape was characterised by a fragmentation of concessionary interests that contrasted with the B.P.M.-dominated East-Atjeh and Tamiang blocks. The N.L.A.M.’s independent-Dutch character also makes it a representative case-study of the smaller East Indian oil companies that occupied the niches of the industry not controlled by the three major international groups.
See Also
- Acheh
- Atjeh oil complex
- B.P.M.
- East Atjeh oil block
- N.I.A.M.
- N.K.P.M.
- N.N.G.P.M.
- N.P.P.M.
- Oil exploration in North Sumatra
- Pasé oil field
- Peureula
- Pulu Pandjang
- Royal Dutch Shell
- Tamiang oil block
- Van Bemmelen’s The Geology of Indonesia (1949)
- 1940
- 1941
Source
The Geology of Indonesia, by R. W. van Bemmelen, Vol. II: Economic Geology (The Hague: Government Printing Office; Martinus Nijhoff, 1949), p. 9 (Table 4: Oil production in 1940 and 1941).