Nigeria’s state-run oil company, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp., signed a memorandum of understanding in June with the China State Construction Engineering Corp. Ltd. to create three oil refineries and a petrochemical plant. Each refinery in the $23.8-billion deal would have a production capacity of 250,000 barrels per day, according to Xinhua, China’s official news agency.
A consortium of Chinese banks, including China’s Export and Credit Insurance Corp. and China’s Export-Import Bank, is expected to provide funding. The loans would be repaid from the refinery production stream, with the Chinese managing the refineries until loans are repaid. Despite being the world’s 12th-largest oil producer and the eighth-largest oil exporter, Nigeria imports nearly 85% of its fuel needs due to the crumbling state of its four state-owned refineries.