Wood Group, Harbour Energy partner for UK North Sea operations

(Reuters) -British oilfield services firm Wood Group has signed an agreement worth around $330 million with UK North Sea oil and gas producer Harbour Energy that will create hundreds of jobs at its operations in Aberdeen, Scotland, and offshore. Under the agreement, Wood will provide engineering, procurement, construction and maintenance services for a number of Harbour's offshore assets critical to UK energy security, the company said in a statement on Monday.

"Signing of this contract is an important step forward in establishing our suite of long-term strategic partnerships across our North Sea assets," said Audrey Stewart, vice-president of supply chain at Harbour.

The agreement will run for an initial term of five years, with five one-year extension options, the statement added.

In July, Britain committed to granting hundreds of licences for North Sea oil and gas extraction, saying this was part of efforts to become more energy independent.

Shares of Wood Group were trading up more than 1% at 0720 GMT, while Britain's largest North Sea oil and gas producer Harbour was up less than 1%.

(Reporting by Radhika Anilkumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich and David Holmes)