Côte d’Ivoire seeks OPEC membership after major oil finds

Côte d’Ivoire is in the process of meeting the criteria to join the OPEC, the country’s oil and mining minister amadou Sangafowa Coulibaly announced.

This came few days after ENI said it found significant reserves of oil offshore Côte d’Ivoire, with a specific well in particular having as much as 1.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent of potential resources.

This will be ENI’s second big hydrocarbon discovery off the West African nation over the past few years following on from its play opening Baleine find that was fast-tracked to first production in 2023.

“If yesterday Côte d’Ivoire was just an importing country, with these various discoveries, we will pass, in a very near time, to that of a net exporter of petroleum products,” the oil minister said in a statement.

The Ivorian government is planning to make the extractive industry the second pillar of the Ivorian economy after agriculture, he said.