Seismic testing for gas in the South China Sea by an Anglo-Filipino consortium has been halted after an incident in which Manila says two Chinese boats threatened to ram a survey ship.
Last week, a Singapore-registered French-owned survey ship, conducting tests in the Reed Bank was stopped by two Chinese patrol boats.
Beijing claims the area as part of its territorial waters in the South China Sea.
The Philippines insists the Reed Bank is within its sovereign territory and has awarded an exploration contract to the consortium to find and extract natural gas.
Energy Secretary Jose Rene Almendras said the seismic tests would resume after the Philippines and China hold talks to resolve the dispute.
Manila will send maritime affairs experts to Beijing later this week for negotiations.
"They had to pack up and reconstitute everything," Reuters quoted Almendras as telling reporters, saying it would take a few days to restart the tests. "We have to wait, but we hope to resume."
Lieutenant-General Juancho Sabban, commander of military forces in the Western Philippines, said the Chinese ships had shadowed and threatened to ram the survey vessel.
They left the area after the military sent two aircraft to the area following a request for help from the survey ship.
The Chinese Embassy said last week that China had sovereignty over the waters and that disputes should be resolved through peaceful negotiations.
China and the Philippines are among six states laying claim to the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, a territory believed to be sitting on rich deposits of oil, gas and minerals.
Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam and Taiwan are the other claimant states.
China and the Philippines also dispute sovereignty over the Scarborough shoal in the South China Sea near the former US navy base in Subic on the main Philippine island of Luzon.
The Philippines military has stepped up patrols of the country's western maritime borders after the Reed Bank incident, Sabban told reporters, saying tension has subsided.
"We are obliged to patrol the area," Sabban said, adding navy ships that bring supplies to nine Philippine-held islands in the disputed Spratly Islands regularly passed through the Reed Bank.
The Philippines is getting a large patrol boat from the US in the next three months to boost its maritime border patrol capabilities in the South China Sea.
In 2002, China and the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations signed a non-binding code of conduct to restrain claimant-states from conducting military activities and other provocative actions that could raise tension.
The two sides are also holding talks on a set of guidelines to implement an informal code of conduct in the South China Sea, a step towards a formal and legal agreement in the disputed territories.
