Sudan’s oil giant set to meet Ethiopia’s annual fuel demand

Sunday 8 August 2010

By Tesfa-Alem Tekle

August 7, 2010 (ADDIS ABABA) — Sudan Petroleum Corporation (Sudapet), the state-owned oil producing giant, heads toward becoming Ethiopia’s only Benzene supplier, ending the aged-long fuel imports of the country mainly from the Middle East.

The Ethiopian Petroleum Enterprise said today that the Sudanese oil company will begin supplying 100 percent of Ethiopia’s annual benzene consumption as of next month.

An agreement signed five years ago between Ethiopian Petroleum Enterprise, a state owned and sole importer of fuel, and Sudan Petrolatum, now Ethiopia’s sole benzine supplier, was to expire this year.

However, Earlier this year, a new benzene supplying agreement was signed between governments of Ethiopia and Sudan, extending their cooperation for another year.

The Ethiopian Petroleum Enterprise has planned to import 2,176,188 tonnes of fuel including benzene with projected budget of 1.42 billion USD for the current fiscal year. The volume of the fuel projected to be imported this year exceeds that of last year by 500,000 tonnes.

In the past five years, benzene supplies from Sudan had accounted lessthan 10% of Ethiopia’s annual consumption. Currently, Sudan supplys 82 percent of Ethiopia’s annual benzene consumption

The Horn of Africa country had been spending massive costs for inspection and vessel prices to import Fuel all the way from the Middle East. This makes the benzene that comes from Sudan significantly cheaper.

According to Ethiopia petroleum enterprise officials, Ethiopia saves millions of dollars every year by importing from neighboring Sudan instead of imports of Middle East and other destinations abroad via the port of Djibouti.

Ethiopia spends over 50 % of its total export earnings to meet nation’s fuel demand and Sudan has now become the major source for the fact that it is only next door.

In return, the vast country of Sudan imports agricultural products and livestock from Ethiopia. It actually is one of the biggest importing countries of Ethiopian products.

ST

Ethiopian Officials Give Djibouti Land to Grow Wheat

Reuters.com -- Land-locked Ethiopia has given Djiboutian President Omar Ismail Guelleh large tracts of land for wheat farming and a lakeside holiday home, officials said on Tuesday.

The Red Sea state has been Ethiopia's major outlet to the sea since Addis Ababa lost the ports of Assab and Massawa when Eritrea won independence in 1991.

Ethiopia gave Guelleh 7,000 hectares of land some 400 km (250 miles) south of Addis Ababa, where government officials say he will grow wheat.

"A team of experts has already started preliminary work to set up a modern and mechanized farm," said the officials, who spoke on the condition on anonymity.

Guelleh, who was in Ethiopia last week with his wife and a ministerial delegation, was also given 10,000 square metres of lakeside land some 45 km (30 miles) east of the capital on which to build a holiday home, the officials said.

Guelleh already owns a $5 million presidential residence in Ethiopia's eastern town of Dire Dawa, they said.

Djibouti's port earns about $300 million a year from handling some 4.6 million tonnes of Ethiopian goods, and recently said it would raise its tariffs on port services, prompting Ethiopia to send its trade minister to Djibouti.

Last month Djibouti accused Eritrea, which is also at loggerheads with Ethiopia, of starting clashes on their border in which 12 Djiboutian soldiers were killed and 55 wounded.

Eritrea denied its troops had crossed the border and rejected Western criticism that it had started the fighting.