The Volta River Ahtority of Ghana (VRA) and China’ Shenzhen Energy Corporation (SEC) will develop a coal plant with a global capacity of 2,000 MW. Located in Ekumfi Aboano, the infrastructure will cost about $1.5 billion. Construction will start by Q2 2016 and will be funded by China-African Development Fund. Jacob Brown Yawson who is in charge of VRA’s technical services revealed...

Nigerian Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, confirmed news about Panda bonds mentioned by Reuters last month. He said his country, Africa’s top GDP ranked economy, plans to issue Panda bonds (issued and subscribed in Yuan Renminbi, China’s currency) to plug its budget deficit. “The opportunity now, with the renminbi being a reserve currency, we are looking obviously at the lowest cost of...

Tanzania aims to become an energy exporter, over the next two years, state-owned power utility TANESCO revealed. Truly, the nation plans to export 2,000 MW of electricity to Kenya, by 2018. The project costs about $300 million and will be sponsored by African Development Bank (AfDB). According to TANESCO’s Deputy Executive Director, Deckian Mhaiki, Kenya said it needs 1,000 MW. The...

In Tunisia, journalist and TV host Borhane bsaïes resigned from his position at the Private TV channel Nessma owned by Nabil karoui. The journalist who hosted one of the channel’s major shows known as Ness Nessma was also in charge of its communication. Regarding reasons for his resignation, Borhane Bsaïes simply said there was a divergence of opinions. He joined Nessma TV in November 2013...

Nigeria for the month of January, produced 66.49 million BO and condensate signifying an average production of 2.14 million bpd according to FSDH Merchant Bank Limited’s monthly economic report. This signifies a rise of approximately 2.97%, compared to December 2015. During the January output level, Joint Ventures accounted for approximately 29.89%, Production Sharing Contracts (PSC) about...

China’s investment of $6 billion in the Rovuma/Gauteng pipeline, will help Mozambique’s industrialization strategy and reinforce the Chinese existence in the country, Macauhub reports. As reported last month, the feasibility study of the 2,600km pipeline is to be performed by the China Petroleum Pipeline Bureau. Upon agreement of the investment decision, 70% of the financing will be...

In Ghana, reality dawned on Brazilian firm Usibras, quite rapidly. In the space of five months only, Brazil’s biggest cashew processing firm who injected $35 million to develop a processing plant in Ghana has started complaining about challenges associated to cashew supply. The plant which was announced at the beginning of 2015 was finally established in November. It has a capacity of...

Cairn Energy is getting set to commence the drilling of the fourth exploration well in the current evaluation programme, following the successful conclusion of the third well BEL-1, offshore Senegal. Works on the BEL-1 well was completed after drilling, coring and logging and the well is currently being plugged and abandoned prior to the departure of the drillship Ocean Rig Athena to the...

Saudi Arabia will supply 700,000 tonnes of petroleum products per month to Egypt under a $23 billion five-year contract between Saudi Aramco and the Egyptian General Petroleum Corp (EGPC), an official revealed. Under the deal, Saudi Aramco will supply Egypt with 400,000 tonnes of gas oil, 200,000 tonnes of benzene and 100,000 tonnes of Mazut. This contract is part of Saudi Arabia's...

“General vaccination of poultry helped rapidly limit the impact of avian flu H9N2,” Moroccan Minister of Agriculture, Aziz Akhannouch, said as he was indicating that the country’ poultry industry was safe from the disease. As the epidemic spread across the Cherifian kingdom, its authorities reassured the population telling them it was safe to eat local poultry. Minister of Health, Houcine...