Page 12 - AfrOil Week 04 2023

AfrOil POLICY AfrOil

Stephen Opata, the official in charge of financial December. The previous month, Ghana, Afri-
markets at the Bank of Ghana, told Joy FM that ca’s second-largest gold producer, ordered large
the shipment meets just 20% of demand in the mining companies to sell 20% of the metal they
West African country. “The product was cleared refine to the nation’s central bank, as the govern-
from the ports today and I know that BOST has ment embarked on the barter plan.
started selling,” he said. “This is just 20% of our Ghana’s cedi ended 2022 as the second-weak-
market needs [and] from the numbers I have est currency in Africa with a year-to-date loss of
seen the prices are better than what is at the 38.86% to the US dollar, according to Bloomb-
ex-pump prices right now.” erg’s ranking of “Worst Spot Returns.” The cur-
He added: “Because this is just 20% of our rency had recorded over 55% loss against the
needs, it will not make that much impact as it greenback since the start of 2022, adding to the
would if we were to be doing 100% of our diesel country’s soaring inflation, but rallied in the sec-
needs.” ond and third week of December.
The government announced late in 2022 that The rally came following the prospects of
it would no longer use US dollars reserves to pur- a $3bn bailout from the International Mone-
chase oil as part of measures aimed at addressing tary Fund (IMF), long anticipated and finally
the depreciation of the cedi, which contributed announced on December 13, subject to approval
to a spike in inflation, which reached 54.1% in by the lender’s board. ™

PROJECTS & COMPANIES
Libya’s NOC preparing to sign deal with

Eni to develop two offshore gas fields

LIBYA FARHAT Bengdara, the chairman of Libya’s is working to maintain output steady. It uses
National Oil Corp. (NOC), said on January 23 more than half of total yields, or 850-900 mmcf
that his company was gearing up to sign a deal (24.07-25.50 mcm) per day, to produce elec-
with Italy’s Eni on the development of two off- tricity at thermal power plants (TPPs), while
shore natural gas fields. exporting another 250 mmcf (7.08 mcm) per
Speaking to the Al-Masar television channel, day and retaining the rest for local use, mostly
Bengdara said that NOC and Eni were on track by industrial consumers. ™
to finalise the new agreement on January 28.
The deal will cover two fields that were explored
under a previous deal signed in 2008 and found
to contain gas. These sites were originally slated
to come online in 2017-2018 but have remained
idle, he noted.
The NOC chief did not identify the fields by
name but said that Eni and NOC anticipated
that the costs of development would top $8bn.
This is higher than the original estimate, owing
to cost inflation, he said.
As of press time, Eni had not commented
on or confirmed his remarks. The Italian major
extracted some 198bn cubic feet (5.607bn cubic
metres) of gas in Libya in 2021, the last year for
which verified data are available.
Currently, the Italian company’s main vehicle
in Libya is Mellitah Oil & Gas, a joint venture
with NOC. Through the venture, the partners
are developing the Bahr Essalam and Wafa
fields. Gas from these sites is exported to Italy
via the Green Stream pipeline, an 8 bcm conduit
that follows a 520-km path across the Mediter-
ranean Sea from the Libyan coast to Gela, a city
in Sicily.
Libya is currently producing about 1.5 bcf
(42.48mn cubic metres) per day of gas and Italy receives Libyan natural gas via the Green Stream pipeline (Image: Fanack)

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 04 26•January•2023