All articles in the Africa In Business Section:

THE DOMESTIC PRICE OF GAS IS $3.1(or400) naira per thousand standard cubic feet (msf)to industrial users.

For sale to the country’s power utility, PHCN,  the price is $0.12 or (16 naira) from the state gas company NGC.

Either way, it is NGC (Nigerian Gas Company) that sells directly to the end user.

As part of the effort to develop the National Gas Master Plan, the Nigerian government approved gas pricing of $. 10 per thousand cubic feet (Mscf) for the producer and $0.3 0/Msf) for the transmitter for National Strategic Projects (Independent Power Plants, PHCN projects and Fertilsers). Now the plan is to aggregate all of this, so that a standard price will be adopted for the domestic gas market. In the aftermath of the enactment of the downstream gas act, the Nigerian Gas Company (NGC) will be unbundled into two entities Nigerian Gas Transportation Company (NGTC) and Nigerian Gas Marketing Company. Every gas producer will sell to the Nigerian Gas Marketing Company.

The Escravos to Warri North leg of the Escravos – Lagos Pipeline System (the nerve of the Nigerian domestic gas supply system) is down, taking out l70MMscf/d. That leaves roughly 430MMscf/d on the EPLS system This is the entire throughput of the EPLS, which supplies the 1, 200MW(capacity)Egbin Power Plant, the country’s largest, gas fired power plant, as well as Gaslink (50MMscf/d) which  supplies to factories in the north of Lagos and Shell Nigeria Gas SNG (50mmscf/d) for sale to industries in the western flank of Lagos.

WAGP will transmit l40MMscf/d. This certainly requires an increase of 70MMscf/d each) from Shell and Chevron into the ELPS, when WAGP comes on stream in the second quarter of 2007..

THE AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT Fund (ADF) is opening up intra continental trade links with the provision of loans for road infrastructure connecting different countries in the different regions of Africa.

Close to a $l00 million will be used to upgrade local road network, as well as strengthen links between Lesotho and South Africa in the south and Guinea and Senegal in the west. Upgrading works on the Likalaneng-Thaba Tseka stretch of the Trans-Maloti highway, a vital link connecting Maseru, Lesotho’s capital city, and the towns of Likalaneng and Thaba Tseka to the seaport of Durban in South Africa, will benefit from a $10.5 Million loan. The road also connects poor rural mountainous areas to the productive lowlands of the country. The project will include the upgrading of 85 km of existing gravel road to a bitumen road standard of a width of 7-metre carriageway and 1.0 meter paved shoulders on either side between Likalaneng and Thaba Tseka. A major highway between Guinea and Senegal will be partly Funded by another $ 85 million loan. The money will pay for road upgrade between Labe in Guinea to Tambacounda in Senegal, opening tip the high agricultural and livestock potential areas in the two countries, and strengthening regional cooperation and economic integration by reducing non-tariff barriers and ‘invisible’ costs. The link will help develop business activities along the corridor and boost the living conditions of local populations, in the view of the ADF. Construction of 385 km of tarred road between Labe and Médina Gounass involves 316 km in Guinean territory and 69 km in Senegalese territory and would also see to the rehabilitation of 89 km of tarred road between Medina Gounass and Tambacounda, while upgrading 190 km of rural roads in the two countries. The money includes a $31 million loan benefiting Senegal and a grant of $54 million in favour of Guinea and the West African Economic and Monetary Commission (UEMOA/WAEMU) to the tune of$ 8.4 million.