A Good Year for Forte Oil

Fri, Apr 5, 2013

By publisher

5 MIN READ

A Good Year for Forte Oil

It is good news for the shareholders of Forte Oil Plc. The company has declared a profit after tax of N1.007 billion for the 2012 financial year. The result released to the Nigerian Stock Exchange, April 2, showed that the figure represented a gain of 105 percent over the N19.54 billion loss recorded in 2011. The company also declared a profit before tax of N1.15 billion in 2012 compared to a loss os N19.95 billion in 2011, representing an increase of 106 percent.

Akin Akinfemiwa, group chief executive of Forte Oil, said that the 2012 marked the beginning of the company’s three-year transformation to a strong and technology-driven organisation. “As we move into 2013 and beyond, we are positive that we shall consolidate on the gains of 2012 to achieve exceptional performance as we move towards our vision of becoming Africa’s No 1 energy solutions provider,” Akinfemiwa said.

Focus on Western Africa Oil and Gas

With an interior domain across 27 countries, covering one half of the African land mass, and an offshore potentials from Morocco to the Cape, the Western African oil and gas exploration zone is one of the world’s richest and most promising for ventures and new opportunities in the upstream market. The 19th Western Africa Oil, Gas and Energy Conference 2013 will focus on the oil and gas opportunities and potential, both offshore and onshore, in this vast zone. The conference is to be hosted by Global Pacific and Partners and will hold from April 22 to 24 at the Hilton Hotel in Windhoek, Namibia. The meeting will reveal opportunities and business cases for hydrocarbon exploration, discovery and development as well as gas-LNG and energy development.

The key focus lies on major players, government opportunities, leading independents, Atlantic basins and gas/LNG markets, and Western Africa’s many prospective oil and gas frontiers. “No global player or emerging independent with an international footprint, or even a fast-growing state oil company, can afford to underrate this world-class Western African play,” Duncan Clarke, chairman and chief executive officer, CEO, of Global Pacific and Partners said. He added: “Western Africa offers a rich suite of technical and corporate options: abundant acreage, acquisitions, bid rounds, new exploration frontiers, a consistent record of oil and gas discoveries, rising oil and gas reserves, attractive contract terms, competitive potentials in LNG ventures across several countries, and even large undeveloped resources in heavy oil, oil sands, and emerging shale gas and oil ventures.”

Those expected at the conference are representative of governments, national oil companies, licensing agencies and leading corporate players. It will feature programme highlight presentations about future offshore and onshore potential in numerous countries including, inter alia: Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon, Sierra Leone, Mauritania, Sao Tome, Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Namibia and Congo –plus on regional projects and joint development zones, and the West African gas pipeline.

Prior to the conference, the 9th Western Africa strategy briefing by Clarke on April 22,  will provide key insights on the region’s corporate upstream oil and gas game, government policies and state oil firms’ strategies, and bid rounds and open acreage by licensing agencies – with presentations from Africa’s leading oil and gas strategist.

Clean Energy Entrepreneurs Competition

The Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa, SEFA, and its partners has launched a business plan competition called the West Africa Forum for Clean Energy Financing, WAFCEF, to identify promising regional entrepreneurs and unlock renewable energy and energy efficiency investments in West Africa.

Sponsors of the initiative include the US Agency for International Development’s, USAID, Regional Clean Energy Investment Initiative, RCEII, ECOWAS Regional Centre for Renewable Energy Efficiency, ECREEE, and the Climate Technology Initiative Private Financing Advisory Network, CTI PFAN.

Other strategic partners include the West African Development Bank, WADB, and African Biofuels and Renewable Energy Company, ABREC, affiliated with ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development, EBID. The Forum, which will assume a business plan competition format, aims to identify and nurture entrepreneurs, start-ups and existing companies with promising clean energy projects in West Africa and serve as a conduit between them and financiers.

The competition is open to all businesses and entrepreneurs operating and registered in any of the ECOWAS countries as well as foreign individuals and entities with projects in those countries. For consideration, the projects should be in the range of  $1 million to  $50 million, and should reasonably demonstrate commercial and technical viability.

Projects selected for a shortlist will attend a project development and financing workshop and will receive free individual professional mentoring on further development of their business plans. WAFCEF will be held in Accra, Ghana, over a three-day period in early October 2013. At the Forum, five to 10 qualified project sponsors will have the opportunity to present their business plans to invited investors and make a pitch for financing.

As part of the competition, an expert panel, including investors, industry specialists and business executives with a keen interest in enabling cleaner and greener projects in West Africa, will judge the finalists’ presentations and select the top three  projects for the West African Clean Energy Financing Awards.

SEFA is a joint initiative between the African Development Bank and the Government of Denmark comprising of resources of up to $56 million to unlock investments in small and medium scale sustainable energy projects on the African continent.

Compiled by Maureen Chigbo

— Apr. 15, 2013 @ 01:00 GMT