Iran plans to raise its crude production capacity by 3 million b/d, oil ministry news agency Shana quoted a senior official as saying Monday. 

Speaking on the sidelines of a petroleum exhibition in Iran, National Iranian Oil Co.'s deputy head for engineering and development, Gholam-Reza Manouchehri, said the aim of boosting the country's output capacity by such a substantial amount would be to promote and stabilize its footing in OPEC and the global market, Shana reported. 

The agency did not mention any target date envisioned for the increase. 

It also reported Manouchehri as saying that NIOC for considering signing $80 billion of deals with domestic and international contractors within the next two years. 

Following the lifting of international nuclear sanctions on Iran in January 2016, NIOC has so far signed 24 memoranda of understanding with domestic and international companies seeking to join oil and gas development projects in the country, including a recent MOU with Philippine National Oil Co. for studies of Iran's Pazanan and Darkhowin oil fields, he said. 

Iran produced 3.77 million b/d of crude in April, the latest S&P Global Platts survey of OPEC production shows. 

Manouchehri made his remarks as Iranian president Hassan Rouhani campaigns for re-election in voting scheduled for May 19. 

The NIOC official was promoted in April 2016 to his current position, as head of what was then a newly formed division of the national oil company, in a surprise move by Iran's oil minister Bijan Zanganeh.