Chinese workers ride bikes at the Khartoum Refinery in Sudan on April 5, 2010. Guo Tieliu / for China Daily

AL JAILI / JUBA, Sudan - Although the entire landscape to the north of the Sudanese capital Khartoum seems like a desert, in Al Jaili, a township about 70 kilometers from the capital, a different scene appears.

Four big lakes, each as large as 18,000 square meters, lie in the desert, surrounded by forests. With fish in the water, different sorts of water birds can be found there, and animals such as lizards and wildcats live in the forests.

This is neither an oasis, nor is the water from the nearby Nile River. It is actually wastewater from a nearby factory, Khartoum Refinery.

"We never discharge a single drop of wastewater into the Nile," said Zhao Yujun, general manager of the refinery, co-owned by China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and the Sudanese government.

Zhao, 41, from Northwest China's Gansu province, said the refinery, in which CNPC has a 40 percent stake, cleans the waste before discharging it into the lakes.

Due to the hot climate, about one-third of the water evaporates each year, with the remainder used to further green this arid environment.

Water is a very precious resource in Sudan. For Zhao, using the water economically defines how the refinery fulfils its social responsibilities and benefits the local population.

"We have a big budget each year for social programs," Zhao said.

Located about 14 km from the Nile, Zhao's factory is now the biggest refinery in Sudan.

It produces up to 5 million tons of refined oil annually, about 80 percent of Sudan's total domestic market consumption.

Apart from discharging cleaned wastewater into four lakes to improve the environment, the refinery also supplies free water and electricity to nearby villages.

Zhao said the refinery has also created a number of job opportunities for local people, and his goal is for it to have a 100 percent locally hired workforce in a few years.

"We have a big plan that by the end of 2014 or early 2015, all positions will go to local people," he said. "We call it 'Sudanization'."

Out of the refinery's 1,200-strong workforce, 23 percent are Chinese and the rest are Sudanese. When the refinery was founded, only 30 percent of the staff were Sudanese, according to Zhao.

"All international firms face the issue of localization. It is what we are pursuing. CNPC's goal is to be an international energy firm," he added.

Zhao added that the first priority of the refinery is to ensure Sudan's oil security, and it plans to expand its annual refining capacity up to 7.5 million tons.

"That should satisfy Sudan's domestic needs," he said.

China's oil cooperation with Sudan began in September 1995, when CNPC signed an agreement with the Sudanese government to exploit the Muglad Basin in the central part of the country.

Production began in 1996 with the development of the Heglig and Unity fields in blocks 1, 2 and 4. On Aug 31, 1999, the first cargo of crude departed Port Sudan for Singapore.

Total daily output in Sudan is now around 500,000 barrels.

In addition to boosting the number of local people on its payroll in Sudan, CNPC has done a great deal to improve the local community, such as building hospitals and schools.

"No other international firm in Sudan has done more than CNPC in corporate social responsibility," said an unnamed official at the company's Khartoum office.

After Sudan's central government signed a peace agreement with then southern rebels in 1972 to end the first Sudanese civil war, China offered agricultural and medical aid.

The first Chinese medical team arrived in the country in the early 1970s.

By the end of 2009, CNPC had donated nearly $50 million to charities in Sudan, according to its 2010 corporate social responsibility report.

The company has also built 35 schools in villages and areas near oilfields, benefiting more than 70,000 children.

It has built four hospitals and 109 clinics in the communities, the report added.

It said that more than 2 million local people benefited from CNPC's dedication to public welfare.

In addition, it spent around $600,000 on a PC center at the University of Juba, which is now the most modern building in the future capital of south Sudan.

Hao Hongshe, economic and commercial counselor of the Chinese embassy in Khartoum, suggested that CNPC focus more on Sudan's agricultural development.

"When Sudan splits into two, about 80 percent of the oil will be in the south. The north will definitely feel the pinch, so agriculture should be the focus of CNPC's efforts in public welfare."

Africa currently supplies about 12 percent of the world's oil, boasts significant untapped reserves and has surpassed the Middle East as the largest regional supplier of crude oil to the United States, according to Thirst for African Oil, a report published in 2009 by the London-based Royal Institute of International Affairs.

Only about 13 percent of Africa's total oil exports go to China, while both Europe and the US import more than 30 percent, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said in March 2010.

Oil exploration in Sudan began about 100 years ago, but the first oil discovery had to wait until 1979, when Chevron found oil near Abu Jabra and at al Sharaf, both on the Darfur-Kordofan boundary.

In 1982, the US company made two major discoveries at the Heglig and Unity oil fields, which are now the most productive in Sudan.

Chevron suspended its operations in Sudan after the second civil war between the north and south broke out in 1983.

Until 1996, and the involvement of Chinese and Malaysian oil companies, little oil production was achieved.

CNPC also constructed the 1,540-km pipeline that connects the oilfields of the south with Port Sudan in the north, from where the oil is exported.

China Daily

(China Daily 05/06/2011 page11)