- The African Energy Bank would address the funding challenge often associated with oil and gas projects.
- APPO hopes to get technological support from Canada’s oil and gas industry.
The African Petroleum Producers Organisation (APPO) has announced a $5 billion investment to establish an African Energy Bank (AEB). According to APPO, the investment is to develop oil and gas assets across oil-producing member countries.
The Secretary General of APPO, Dr Omar Ibrahim, said the bank would be established in collaboration with Afreximbank. Ibrahim disclosed this at a news conference held alongside the ongoing 24th World Petroleum Congress (WPC) in Calgary, Canada, the News Agency of Nigeria reported. He explained that establishing the bank would address the funding challenge often associated with oil and gas projects.
According to him, the AEB aims to close the gap resulting from the decision of Western financiers to discontinue funding the industry, especially in Africa. The APPO SG said the bank would assist investors who believe that Africa needs to use all forms of available energy for the foreseeable future to eliminate the enormous poverty in the continent. He, however, said that the bank would also look into other energies.
On strategies to address the technology and expertise challenge, Ibrahim said a team from the Secretariat undertook an assessment tour to establish the professional level of these institutions. “In pursuing this objective, we believe that partnership with players from the technological countries will be fruitful. Canada’s oil and gas industry is one place we believe we can come for technological support. Partnerships are critical to our success, and we are prepared to partner with all like-minded institutions to pursue our objectives,” he added.
Ibrahim disclosed that APPO is addressing the market and energy infrastructure challenges. He explained that the organisation was working on producing a blueprint to integrate the African continent by establishing cross-border energy infrastructure. Regrettably, he said most of the energy infrastructure on the continent today was established to serve extra-Africa interests.
“That is why our pipelines run from the fields to the sea ports for export. The time has come for us to route these pipelines from areas of plenty to areas of need within Africa. For too long, we have been told that Africans do not have purchasing power, so our energy needs external markets. But we all know that energy is the most significant catalyst for economic development. So, if people cannot access energy because they lack purchasing power, when will they escape poverty?
“Deliberate policies must be created to give our people access to energy, and with that, the poverty cycle shall be broken. Give the people energy not just to light their homes but to do cottage industries, and you will be shocked at the quantum leap in the national Gross Domestic Products,” he added.