Browsing: oil prices

• Kenya’s high-interest rates hit 13 per cent in the last review by the Central Bank of Kenya.
• Since mid-2023, however, the World Bank’s index of commodity prices has remained essentially unchanged.
• World Bank reiterates that between mid-2022 and mid-2023, global commodity prices plummeted by nearly 40 per cent.

Kenyan consumers will have to bear the high cost of borrowing for much longer as Central Banks will not loosen their monetary policies any time soon, the World Bank has said.

The lender says the continued tightening will be a result of the prevalent global economic shocks, such as the Middle East conflict, which is threatening to halt the inflationary decline that has occurred in the past two years.

“Global commodity prices are leveling off after a steep descent that played a decisive role in whittling down overall inflation last year,” the World Bank says in its latest commodity markets outlook. “However,

The DRC’s untapped deposits of copper, gold, diamonds, cobalt, uranium and coltan are some of the raw minerals estimated to be worth more than US$ 24 trillion.…

It is not secret that South Sudan relies on oil to fuel most of its economy and state coffers, and that the revenue of such oil is dependent upon its export via pipeline to Port Sudan.

As a result, oil cooperation between both countries is at the centre of key economic activity: Sudan’s economy benefits from transit fees paid by South Sudan, and South Sudan’s economy benefits from Sudan’s oil export infrastructure. While one doesn’t go without the other, oil prices instability disturbs a tricky balance put in place between both countries.

In December 2016, as oil prices had fallen drastically below $40 dollars a barrel, the Agreement on Oil and Related Economic Matters (AOREM) between Sudan and South Sudan, known popularly as Cooperation Agreement, was due to expire, and Transitional Financial Arrangements (TFA) fees of $3.02bn due to Sudan were not yet fully paid, the two sisterly countries, mindful …