Petroliam Nasional Bhd has given its assurance that there will be no reduction in the number of employees or retrenchment in the national oil company, although the group is in the midst of trimming capital cost to strengthen its resiliency.

However, it is mulling a pay cut in light of the continued challenging market conditions for the industry, its president and group chief executive officer Tengku Muhammad Taufik Tengku Aziz said.

"The final deliberations are ongoing. Any decision on the matter will be conveyed to our employees first," he said when asked on a possible pay cut.

"We have explored possible options (to reduce cost)...we also want to be a responsible management.

"We do not want to pursue the path of reduction or retrenchment. We will have to proceed and take shared pain as a workforce, but we are not in the position of having to do retrenchment," he told reporters after announcing the group's performance for the first half ended June 30, 2020 (H1 2020) here today.

Petronas has 47,669 employees as of 2019.

Petronas recorded a 23 per cent year-on-year reduction in revenue for H1 2020 at RM93.6 billion, on the back of lower average realised price for all products and lower sales volume, mainly from processed gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Tengku Muhammad Taufik said the outlook remains challenging and the group's 2020 performance would be severely affected by the low oil price and weak demand environment.

As such, the group plans to preserve more cash and maintain its liquidity via a 21 per cent reduction in capital cost and 12 per cent lower operating expenditure, targeted by year-end.

-- BERNAMA