MUSCAT, June 17 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese company launched on Monday the first polymer production factory in Oman in partnership with an Omani petroleum firm.

The factory, established by the Chinese company ZL EOR Chemicals and Oman Development petroleum company, covers an area of 33,000 square meters in Raysut industrial area in Salalah Province, about 1,000 km south of the capital Muscat.

The total cost of the factory is about 20 million U.S. dollars.

According to a press release, the production capacity of the plant during the first phase will be about 15,000 tons annually, and will gradually increase to 70,000 tons per year at later stages.

"The factory ... is expected to be operational within a month," Echo Liu, general manager of ZL EOR Chemicals Oman, owner of the factory, told Xinhua in a statement.

Liu added that the factory is of great importance as China is the largest importer of Omani oil, accounting for 80 percent of the country's oil exports.

"We will cooperate with our strategic partner in China to activate the contribution of the factory on several levels, the most important of which is the transfer of modern technologies in this field," Faisal Bin Turki Al Said, representative of the Omani side, said in a statement to Xinhua.