Countries agree on joint regional petroleum refining

Kampala. 14 East African nations have agreed to work out and support regional frameworks for refining petroleum.

The agreement was reached by representatives of Comoros, Burundi, Madagascar, Rwanda, Eritrea, Djibouti, Seychelles, Ethiopia, Somalia, Tanzania, Kenya, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Uganda.

The countries jointly agreed to commit themselves to an East African oil project, to substitute the individual oil refineries that each (oil) producing member in the region had outlined.

The motion fronted by Stephen Dhieu Dau, the minister of petroleum of mining, South Sudan was adopted as one of the recommendations of the 17^th meeting of Intergovernmental Committee of Experts that ended last week in Kampala.

“This project will largely depend on individual political heads (and their commitment) but it’s in our best interest, then possibly we can look at further integration,” he said.

Mr Dau noted that, once implemented, the joint refinery would strengthen cooperation and enhance simultaneous development of the oil sectors in the region; amongst oil rich states like Uganda, Sudan, Kenya, DRC, and others.

He maintained that, just as for the case of Uganda and Kenya, Oil in South Sudan was to start flowing once individual countries establish priorities as such infrastructures, markets, among others, which if there existed a mutual understanding on one refinery could be sped up.

Uganda with oil volumes of 3.5 billion barrels is finalizing plans for a refinery for 60,000 barrels per day by 2015. Sudan is in its advanced stages to construct an own refinery for 10,000 barrels per day, while Kenya, following its latest oil discoveries, is planning to upgrade the old ones.

In unison the countries adopted the refinery framework which includes plans to institute and stock strategic reserves of petroleum to lower the economic costs of energy disruptions while developing partnerships for a regional procurement framework.

Maria Kiwanuka, minister of finance, planning and economic development welcomed the strategy, which she said Uganda was interested and once established, would be a stepping stone to economic integration in the region.

“Uganda welcomes the idea and is ready for such integration. We are about to revise over 54 national laws that will work across the region once approved by the regional parliament and the secretariat,” Ms Kiwanuka informed.