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CHILDREN NEAR EAST LONDON, SOUTH AFRICA
Summary of the region
The African Region, as defined here, has 53 countries, 2 non-independent territories (Reunion and Saint Helena) and one disputed state (Western Sahara). Of these 18 lie in North and Northwest Africa, 15 in West Africa, and 24 in South and East Africa.
The sub-region of North and Northwest Africa includes the major onshore oil and gas producers of Algeria, Egypt and Libya. Egypt also has significant offshore production in the Gulf of Suez and the Nile Delta (gas), while Libya has smaller volumes of offshore oil and gas production and may possess resources in its unexplored Mediterranean waters.
Tunisia has some production offshore adjacent to Libya and also inland where Algerian and Libyan basins overlap the country. Further south Chad has interior oil productive basins whilst Niger, with similar basins, is a new producer.
Morocco, Mauritania, Senegal, Liberia and Sierra Leone have potential for deep water reserves but have only been partially explored. All have discoveries but only modest volumes have been produced (in Mauritania).
West Africa (coastal countries along the central western belt of Africa) has seen growing output of oil from post-rift sediments in deep waters off Nigeria, Angola, Congo-Brazzaville, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire.
Nigeria (and part of neighbouring Cameroon) is also an important onshore and offshore oil and gas producer from Niger Delta delta sediments.
Sub-salt opportunities are being realised off Angola and Namibia. Gabon, Cameroon and Congo-Kinshasa have old onshore and shallow water oil production with all these countries trying to develop gas businesses for local use and export as LNG.
The sub-region of South and East Africa has seen limited success. Both Sudan (North) and South Sudan have oil productive rift basins and South Africa has produced small amounts of oil and gas from offshore waters.
In 2007 the first of many oil discoveries were made in the Uganda rift basin followed, from 2012, by similar accumulations in rift basins in Kenya.
In 2010 and subsequently gas fields were discovered in deep waters off Mozambique and Tanzania which will lead to substantial gas production from the region. The island of Madagascar has heavy oil potential while Botswana may produce CBM gas.
There are six members of OPEC in Africa; Libya, Algeria, Nigeria, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea joining in 2017 and Congo-Brazzaville joining in 2018. Gabon left in 1994 but rejoined in 2016. Angola joined in 2007 and left in 2023.