Page 13 - DMEA Week 44 2022

DMEA REFINING & FUELS DMEA

According to the Stanbic report, it will also bring partly due to commercial disputes between the
$7bn-$15bn per year into the Tanzanian econ- firms and the government and partly because
omy, thereby boosting long-term GDP growth Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s
rates by 6.0-7.5%. predecessor John Magufuli made the East Africa
This is in line with the objectives of the Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) project a higher
government’s 2025 Development Vision pro- priority. Suluhu began working to reinvigorate
gramme and the third Five Year Development talks on Tanzania LNG shortly after she took
Plan (FYDP III), the report noted. office in March 2021. ™
As noted above, the Tanzania LNG project
envisions the development of offshore gas fields
– Block 2, assigned to Equinor, and Blocks 1
and 4, assigned to Shell. These three deepwater
offshore sites hold about 35 trillion cubic feet
(991bn cubic metres) of gas, and their output
will be processed at an LNG plant slated for con-
truction near Lindi in southern Tanzania. This
plant is not expected to come on stream before
2028 at the earliest.
Tanzania’s government began discussing this
plan with Shell and Equinor more than eight
years ago. But the project fell behind schedule, The Tanzania LNG project may cost $30bn (Image: TanzaniaInvest.com)

Ghana has set in motion plan to import

affordable fuel, Information Minister says

AFRICA GHANA’S government has made plans to make Joy News reports.
cheap petroleum products on the domestic mar- This comes as opposition parliamentarians
ket to help consumers, since prices have risen are calling on the administration to cushion
significantly since the start of the year, Informa- Ghanaians from the surge in prices of the com-
tion Minister Kojo Oppong Nkrumah told Joy modities, with MP John Abu Jinapor, ranking
News on October 31. member on the Mines and Energy Committee,
He explained that the Energy Ministry was urging the government to halt the rise in prices.
working with major suppliers to secure supplies “In less than three months, the government
of low-cost fuels, adding that the National Petro- has received over GHS 8bn from our petroleum
leum Authority (NPA) and the ministry would resources. So in three months, the government
provide details in the coming days. “In President has received more than it projected for the whole
[John Kofi Agyekum] Kufuor’s time, we did it year, so the government is making supernormal
with Nigeria, [with] Sahara [Energy] lifting for profits,” Jinapor told journalists on October 2,
us, and you could have supply credit lines and according to a Citi News report. “In fact, even
a fixed price that you could bank on,” he was with the Price Stabilisation and Recovery Levy
quoted as saying on Joy News’s PM Express. which are supposed to subsidise fuel, the gov-
“[It] is a very similar arrangement that has ernment projected that in the first two quarters,
already commenced, and I am expecting that it will receive GHS269mn and as we speak, from
in the coming weeks the NPA and the Energy the Ministry of Finance’s own record, the Gov-
Ministry will have the opportunity to provide ernment has received GHS800mn. And so this
the details.” notion that the Government is not making any
In an address to the nation on October 30, money is a fallacy.”
President Nana Akufo-Addo said that his Meanwhile, the NPA has shied away from
administration was working to secure reliable commenting on the recent surge in prices of
and regular sources of affordable petroleum petroleum products, appearing to be leaving
products for domestic consumption. that in the hands of the Energy and Finance
The move is expected to bring some respite Ministries, Citi News indicated.
and stability to the persistent rise in fuel prices. The surge in petroleum prices has had an
Currently, petrol and diesel are being sold at inflationary effect on the prices of goods and
average prices of GHS18 ($1.31) and GHS23 services in Ghana. As such, they have affected
($1.67) per litre, respectively, up from the previ- the country’s businesses and have contributed to
ous rates of GHS15 ($1.09) and GHS19 ($1.38) a crisis in the cost of living, with annual inflation
per litre, which were already seen as exorbitant, at 37.2% in September, a 21-year high. ™

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