The African Refiners and Distributors Association (ARDA) has decried Africa’s continuous importation of over 70 per cent of its refined petroleum products, a development that threatens the continent’s energy sufficiency.
The group urged oil-producing nations to prioritise adding value to oil production by refining the products. The continent, it said, relies on Europe and other continents for petroleum products. It warned that a 30-day halt in fuel imports would cause severe disruption across Africa, grounding planes, immobilising trucks, and shutting down critical services.
ARDA’s executive secretary, Anibor Kragha, warned that this heavy dependence leaves the continent vulnerable to supply shocks with immediate and far-reaching consequences. If imports were to stop, the collapse wouldn’t just be technical, it would be systemic, he said, speaking at the African Refiners and Distributors Association (ARDA) Week Conference in Cape Town.
A halt in fuel imports would quickly paralyse key sectors. Aviation, trucking, and construction would halt, while jet fuel shortages would isolate countries.
Kragha said the crisis risk was underpinned by Africa’s paradox of being resource-rich but refinery-poor, adding that the continent has more than 40 refineries. Yet, many are outdated, underutilised, or idle.
Nigeria, Africa’s top oil producer, has a nominal refining capacity of 1.1 million barrels per day, including the new 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery. However, it still imports over half of its fuel needs.
Across the continent, crude production far outpaces refining, Kragha decried, adding that in the Republic of Congo, plans have been announced to double crude output to 500,000 barrels per day, but the CORAF Refinery in Pointe Noire currently processes only 24,000 barrels per day, with a planned increase to 40,000 still far below potential despite its proximity to major markets like the DRC.
Meanwhile, energy demand is rising sharply, ARDA said as the association noted that Africa’s population is expected to reach 2.5 billion by 2050, with energy needs projected to double.
Kragha noted that heavy reliance on imports undermines economic sovereignty, widens trade deficits, destabilises currencies, and hampers industrialisation.
He stated that it also threatens the objectives of the African Continental Free Trade Area by reinforcing dependence on external markets instead of building internal resilience.
Kragha stressed that energy security must become a continental priority while arguing that building refining and distribution capacity within Africa is essential to securing sustainable growth.
Energy security isn’t a luxury; it’s a lifeline. Without energy sovereignty, there is no sustainable development, he said.
Kragha called for urgent action to upgrade and expand refining capacity through commercially viable projects, improve infrastructure such as pipelines, depots, and storage terminals, harmonise fuel specifications to boost intra-African trade, attract investment through transparency and risk-mitigation frameworks, and build human capital in regulation, engineering, and operations.
He urged governments to cut red tape, streamline approvals, and tackle infrastructure bottlenecks that make local refining uncompetitive. If petroleum import halts, he said, millions of tonnes of goods, medicines, and food would be stranded in warehouses and ports, unable to move.
Hospitals, telecom towers, water systems, and banks, many of which depend on diesel-powered generators, would shut down. Clinics in rural communities would lose power, and water pressure could collapse in megacities. As supply chains fracture and basic services falter, fuel shortages would trigger food inflation, power cuts, and economic paralysis, creating fertile ground for political instability.
Entire industries, such as mining in South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Zambia, would stop. Critical exports like copper from Zambia and cobalt from the DRC, essential to the global electric vehicle supply chain, would be stranded. Ghana’s gold production would freeze, while oil rigs, vessels, and haul trucks would fall silent.
