Buoyed by the boom and impressive return on investments currently being experienced in downstream oil and gas across Africa, investors and market leaders from from Europe, Asia, and South America are set to join the industry’s topmost players in Africa for three days of business deals and match-making at the 2017 edition of the Oil Trading and Logistics (OTL) Africa Downstream Week.
In a statement released in Lagos, Nigeria on Friday, the event’s secretariat noted that delegates, visitors and exhibitors from more than twenty countries including the United Kingdom, Brazil, South Africa, Angola, Greece, Ghana, China, Switzerland, India, the UAE and Nigeria will converge on the Oriental Hotel Lagos, Nigeria venue of the event from the 22 – 25 October for the annual expo’s 11th outing.
Globally acknowledged as the biggest platform for downstream oil and gas businesses on the continent, the OTL Africa Downstream Week, has consistently promoted African downstream interests and projected its innovations and contemporary energy solutions to the international community.
The event has as its theme, “Downstream – Renewed Opportunities”, and will generate discussions to address salient issues hindering accelerated development in the continent’s downstream industry. Issues to be discussed include prospects for refining in Africa, finance for downstream trading and infrastructure projects and breaking trans-national oil marketing barriers.
Discourse will also revolve around the sector’s disruptive influences, the rising profile and application of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) across the continent, as well as investments in lubricants and petrochemicals production facilities. The downstream sector has also witnessed increased investments seeking to optimize the opportunities available in the petroleum products retail landscape.
The Chairman of the OTL Africa Downstream, Emeka Akabogu said: “Indeed, the event has been packaged to bring together every important stakeholder in Nigeria and other parts of the world to examine issues such as storage, distribution, marketing, funding, shipping, logistics, policy issues among others in Nigeria and globally.”
He added that the strategy was to congregate key organisations from each sub-sector of the industry in Nigeria and other parts of the world to cross fertilize ideas.
“We need to get all key sub-sectors well-represented in order to enhance value delivery to participants and exhibitors. Indeed, there will be many important presentations from Nigeria and other markets and the event is loaded with very significant content”, he said.
This year’s event will further empower African oil and gas companies to harness the economic potential of the downstream sector. OTL presents enormous opportunity for downstream players in Africa to converge. It is a vault of knowledge and experience sharing. It is also a platform to engage each other and pick up useful lessons and experiences.
OTL Africa is the continent’s leading business forum for market insights, emerging opportunities, products’ showcase and recognition of excellence in the African downstream petroleum value-chain. It features a strategic conference, dedicated industry exhibition and the annual OTL Downstream Industry Dinner. It is organised in collaboration with key partners in government and the industry.