The government of cash-strapped South Sudan has agreed to allocate 10,000 barrels of its crude oil per day to Chinese firms to build roads in the country. Chinese companies will build two highways in exchange, the government said in a statement after a cabinet meeting in Juba last weekend. The deputy minister did not specify a deadline on when the allocation of 10,000 barrels of crude oil per day to Chinese companies should end. South Sudan has the third largest oil reserves in sub-Saharan Africa, but most of its oil facilities have been destroyed in the civil war that started in 2013 – two years after it seceded from Sudan. Now every barrel produced is vital to Africa’s youngest nation, as oil provides nearly its entire gross domestic product.

Source: The North Africa Journal February 06, 2019 12:56 UTC