Russia’s Gazprom Neft will decide whether to build a lubricant blending plant in Europe by mid-2017, according to Gazprom Neft-Lubricants CEO Alexander Trukhan.

Gazprom Neft currently produces about 30,000 tonnes of lubricant products in Bari, Italy. The rest of its products are produced in Russia, where it produced 500,000 tonnes in 2015.

Gazpromneft said that sales of G-Energy motor oils increased by 31% year-on-year in January-September 2016. The total volume of product sales in the first nine months of 2016 increased by 5% to 403,500 tonnes. The target volume for 2016 is 540,000 tonnes.

Despite a slowdown in the Russian economy, sales of premium lubricants rose by 13% during the first nine months of 2016 to 124,000 tonnes, driven by the upward trend in the sales of synthetic oils. Another driver of sales growth was the company’s participation in Russia’s import substitution program, which came about following U.S. and EU economic sanctions against Russia.

Export sales of premium lubricants also rose by 21% during the first nine months of 2016 to 68,000 tonnes. Gazpromneft began sales to Colombia, Vietnam, South Korea, Poland and South Africa this year.

In 2016, Gazpromneft continued the implementation of priority projects, including construction of G-Energy Service stations. There are more than 50 stations operating under the G-Energy brand in nine countries: Russia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Italy, Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina and China.