CARACAS, Jan. 1 (Xinhuanet) -- Venezuelan Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez said in a statement on Sunday that 32 privately operated Venezuelan oil fields returned to state control with the start of the new year.

    A deadline expired at midnight Dec. 31 for all private companies with contracts to independently pump oil here to agree to joint ventures that will give Venezuela's state oil company majority control.

    The 32 operating agreements were signed between 1990 and 1997 when Venezuela's petroleum industry was open to private and foreign capital to increase production at low-priority oil field.

    Ramirez said the amount the private companies have invested in the fields will determine the amount of control they have.

    In 2001, President Hugo Chavez's government passed a hydrocarbons law that made the operating agreements illegal by requiring oil production to be carried out by companies controlledby the government.

    Chevron Corp., Royal Dutch Shell PLC, Brazil's state oil company Petrobras S.A. and Spanish-Argentine firm Repsol YPF were among those that signed the contracts to agree to joint ventures. According to the contracts, the state could take as much as a 90 percent stake in the new ventures.

    The 32 oil fields have been responsible for about 500,000 of Venezuela's official declared production of 3.2 million barrels a day.

    Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter and has thelargest proven reserves outside the Mideast. Enditem