Two state-owned companies, South Africa’s Central Energy Fund and South Sudan’s Nile Petroleum Corporation an energy-binding contract that could potentially see South Africa invest over $1 billion in South Sudan’s oil and gas industry.
South Sudan is making drastic progress in the hope of awakening the struggling economy through peace agreements which assure potential businesses of security for their investments.
The world’s youngest country hosted a three-day South Sudan Oil & Power 2018 conference in Juba from November 20-22 with stakeholders within and outside Africa attending to discuss ways of helping the East African country march towards economic growth and development. Leading energy and infrastructure conglomerate, Sahara Power Group joined forces with Africa Oil & Power as a strategic partner for the event imploring the participants to collaborate for an effective partnership.
South Africa’s energy minister Jeff Radebe said, “The whole project, the block exploration together with the refinery, the pipelines, we are looking at an investment of more than one billion US dollars. When this refinery is complete, it will have a capacity of producing 60,000 barrels of oil per day.”
Currently, the country does not have its own refinery, so it sends crude by pipeline across the northern border to Sudan for processing and export, and imports refined fuels. The country has Africa’s third largest oil reserves despite 70 per cent of the country still being unexplored, due to the civil wars. However, with the peace treaties signed, investors have begun showing interest to venture in the economy as it seeks to triple oil production back to the original levels of 350,000 barrels of oil per day
South Africa’s economy may not be as stable as well, but the Southern African Development Community (SADC) nation seek to reap mutual benefits from its investment in the energy sector. South Africa has enjoyed most investment from Russian firms and continue to strengthen trade cooperation through business deals.
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