WASHINGTON - American oil firm ConocoPhillips (IW 500/22) announced Wednesday the slashing of about 200 jobs in Canada, or 7% of its staff in the country in response to plunging oil prices.
"The challenging economic environment has required us to make some difficult decisions," company spokeswoman Andrea Urbanek told AFP.
"Today our Canada business unit notified employees that workforce reductions will affect about 7% of our Canadian workforce. This is about 200 employees."
This follows hundreds of job cuts announced recently by others with mines in the Alberta oil sands, including CNOOC subsidiary Nexen Energy, Suncor and Shell in response to plunging oil prices.
According to the government statistical agency, 20,000 jobs have been shed in Canada's oil sands since September 2014.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2015
