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Egypt’s petroleum minister reports

on progress of gasification initiative

EGYPT EGYPTIAN Petroleum Minister Tarek El-Molla villages that are home to 4mn people.
noted earlier this week that the government’s The ministry indicated that it was already at
domestic gasification programme was making work on the first phase, which involves bring-
progress. ing gas to 199 villages at a cost of EGP3.3bn
In a statement issued by the state informa- ($210.6mn). The second phase of work will
tion agency, El-Molla reported that the Petro- involve the gasification of another 423 villages
leum Ministry had begun supplying natural at a cost of EGP5.5bn ($351mn), while the third
gas to another 1.2mn households during Fiscal phase will bring gas to another 710 villages at a
Year 2020-2021, which ended on June 30. This cost of EGP16bn ($1.021bn), it added.
brought the total number of residential units The ministry is carrying out this three-phase
consuming gas up to 12.32mn, he said. plan within the framework of the Egyptian gov-
He also noted that the geographical range ernment’s Decent Life programme. This initi-
of the gasification programme was expanding. ative targets 4,670 rural villages that are home
Some 88 areas within 18 governorates started to 57% of the country’s population, and it aims
receiving gas for the first time in FY 2020-2021, to improve infrastructure, public facilities and
he stated. vocational services in these communities. ™
El-Molla went on to say that the Petroleum
Ministry intended to continue bringing gas
supplies to larger numbers of people in the cur-
rent fiscal year. This is in line with directives
issued by President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who
is determined to provide Egyptian citizens with
better services and mitigate their hardships, he
reported.
Additionally, he said, the ministry aims to
expand the use of pre-paid meters in order to
facilitate the collection of payments. Egyptian
authorities have already installed 385,000 pre-
paid gas meters and intend to install more in the
future, he stated.

Rural gasification
He was speaking shortly after the Petroleum
Ministry reported on the progress of a three-
phase plan to lay 16,000 km of pipelines to
facilitate gas deliveries to more than 1,000 rural Egypt uses pre-paid meters for both gas and electricity (Photo: Daily News Egypt)

Expert lauds “drill-or-drop”

provisions of Nigeria’s PIB

NIGERIA ADEMOLA Adigun, an oil and gas policy which obligate investors to uphold the terms of
expert who serves as executive vice-president their licences or risk losing them, once the PIB
of the Metacura Development Initiative, has is signed into law by President Muhammadu
praised the Nigerian government’s decision to Buhari.
include “drill-or-drop” provisions in the newly “Drill-or-drop” requirements have the
passed Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB). potential to forestall the misuse of valuable
Adigun said earlier this week that he hoped assets and to optimise revenues from oil and gas
Abuja would strictly enforce these provisions, fields, he said.

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