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UNOC eyeing partner for new oil block exploration

Peter 10th Jul, 2025 Energy Business Edge Reporter
UNOC eyeing partner for new oil block exploration

Ms Proscovia Nabbanja, the UNOC CEO.


Uganda National Oil Company (UNOC) is on the lookout for a joint venture partner to help it explore and develop an oil block in the western part of the African country, a spokesperson for the state-owned oil firm told Reuters on Wednesday.

UNOC signed in 2023 a two-year production sharing agreement with Uganda’s government for the Kasuruban exploration block.

The agreement could be renewed twice for two years, and the state oil firm renewed the deal in March.

  • Kasuruban Block spans 1,285sq kilometers in Buliisa, Hoima and Masindi districts and is the biggest of the five blocks MEMD announced in the second licensing round in May 2019.

Now UNOC wants to develop the block, but is seeking a partner to do so, company spokesperson Angella Ambaho told Reuters, without giving details about the equity stake a potential JV partner would take.

UNOC wants a reputable joint venture partner with the requisite technical and financial capacities and experience, as well as the commitment to support UNOC’s national aspirations to form a joint venture partnership in the contract area.

  • In addition to exploration, UNOC also holds Uganda’s 40% stake in the country’s refinery project, as well as 15% stake in each of the oil projects Tilenga, Kingfisher, and East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP).
UNOC eyeing partner for new oil block explorationA map showing the oil exploration areas around Lake Albert in western Uganda.

UNOC operates as the bridge between Uganda’s aspirations to become an oil producer and the technical expertise of international firms like TotalEnergies and CNOOC, which are the joint venture partners to UNOC in the Tilenga and Kingfisher blocks.

Earlier this year, the $5-billion East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), which is planned to export crude oil from Uganda via a port in Tanzania, secured the first tranche of external financing for the project.

The EACOP project is for a 1,443-kilometer-long (897 miles) pipeline to be built from landlocked Uganda to the Tanga port in Tanzania.

The oil pipeline is expected to bring crude from the Lake Albert project in Uganda to the international oil market.

  • It is designed to transport 216,000 barrels of crude oil per day, with a ramp-up of up to 246,000 bpd, Uganda says.
  • EACOP shareholders are France’s supermajor TotalEnergies with a 62% stake, Uganda National Oil Company Limited (UNOC) with 15%, Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation (TPDC) holding another 15%, and CNOOC, the state oil giant of China, with an 8% interest.

UNOC is a limited liability company owned by the government and mandated to handle commercial interests along the entire value chain in the petroleum sector ensuring that the resource is exploited in a sustainable manner.

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