2merkato

Pepsi Co, INC. and USAID are collaborating in a 10 million US dollars effort to supply locally manufactured nutritional ready to use Supplementary food products (RUSF) to combat malnourishment in children in Ethiopia.

The Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Health, the Agricultural Transformation Agency, Pepsi Co., the WFP and USAID was signed in early May.

The partnership named Enterprise EthioPea is targeted to aid 10,000 farmers in Ethiopia to increase chickpea yields to produce a local based product that can feed 40,000 children.

The American multinational food, snack and beverage corporation PepsiCo Inc. has expressed interest to invest in Ethiopia. Shiferaw Teklemariam (Ph.D.), Ethiopia's Ambassador to South Africa, has held a discussion with senior management of PepsiCo's African branch.

Brazilian petroleum company, Petra Energiya, submitted a proposal for a concession in the Ogaden and Abay basins of Ethiopia according to sources.

The actual blocks that the company has submitted a proposal for are yet to be disclosed as the proposal is being evaluated by experts in the Petroleum Licensing and Administration Section of the Ministry of Mines.

The MoM awards concession upon negotiation with companies unless there are several companies interested in the same block in which case the ministry floats a tender according to officials.

Petro Trans has contracted BGP and Sunrise, Chinese companies, to undertake seismic survey and exploration well drilling of the Calub and Hilala gas fields in Ethiopia according to Richard Spooner, Country Manager for the company.

BGP was hired last month to collect seismic data from the Hilala, calub, Genale and Warder blocks explained Spooner. Experts from the company have already begun analyzing the petroleum data collected from the Ogaden he said.

Petrotrans, the Honk Kong based petroleum company is seeking arbitration for the termination of its gas fields development project by the Ethiopian Ministry of Mines according to sources.

The company is in the process of preparing for a legal suit at the International Arbitration Court in Geneva said the sources.

It is to be remembered that the Ministry of Mines revoked the development agreement signed with the agreement last July claiming that it had failed to execute the project according to the agreed upon schedule.

The company had been unable to initiate actual exploratory activities thus breaching its agreement with the Ethiopian government according to the termination notice sent by Sinkenesh Ejigu, Minister of Mines.