The first batch of 50 trainees for the Dangote Refinery operations training will depart Nigeria for India today.
The 50 are part of 800 Nigerians the President of Dangote Group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote is sending to India to learn the operations of a petrochemical refinery.
The 800 Nigerians, it was gathered, are to be trained in batches of 50, over the next 24 months in the Asian country which has the largest refinery in the world.
The world’s largest refinery, Jamnagar Refinery Reliance Industries, Jamnagar, is in India. Jamnagar refines as many as 1.2 million barrels per day.
The initiative is in a bid to create employment in the Nigerian economy, rather than import expatriates to run the first private refinery in Nigeria.
Dangote is set to build the first private refinery in Nigeria. The refinery, estimated at $9 billion, is projected to have a refining capacity of about 500,000 to 650,000 barrels per day.
“After receiving a private licence to build a refinery, Dangote has commenced the building of a 650,000 barrels per day (BPD) petroleum refinery, which will be the single largest in the world.
“The refinery would have a larger capacity than all of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) refineries put together,” the conglomerate said in an earlier statement.
The refinery, according to Dangote, would be ready to meet the nation’s needs by 2018.
-Leadership
