POLY-GCL Petroleum Group from China plans to start exporting natural gas from Ethiopia’s eastern Ogaden basin by mid-2019 as it continues to explore near the border with Somalia, Petroleum Minister Motuma Mekassa said.

Shipments from the Calub and Hilala fields will be exported along a 700-kilometer (435-mile) pipeline to a port complex being built in neighboring Djibouti, Motuma said in an interview in the capital, Addis Ababa.

“They want to export the gas to Asia,” Motuma said.
Ethiopia is developing gas finds to diversify its $72.3 billion economy, the fastest-growing in Africa over the past decade. The Horn of Africa nation plans to increase natural resources’ contribution to gross domestic product to 10 percent from 1.5 percent by 2025, when it expects to become a middle-income country with gross national income per capita of $1,045 to $12,736.

POLY-GCL Petroleum Group, a partnership between China Poly and Golden Concord Holdings Limited, signed five production-sharing agreements with Ethiopia’s Mines Ministry in 2013 to explore a 117,151 square-kilometer area in the Ogaden basin, according to Motuma.