The nation has signed agreements with Tullow Oil Plc, Africa Oil Corp. and Maersk oil on a joint development study for a pipeline linking the oilfields to an Indian Ocean port being built at Lamu.
Passage of the proposed law is required before an early-oil program can continue. Tullow discovered crude in the north of the country in 2012 and is developing finds estimated at 1 billion barrels of crude. It was scheduled to start production in the first quarter of 2018.
The bill will be reintroduced in parliament when sessions resume in June, according to Aden Duale, the majority leader in the National Assembly. “We shall conclude the law by the second week of June,” he said by phone.
When oil shipments begin, they’ll earn Kenya much-needed foreign exchange and help to diversify the mainly agricultural economy that’s the world’s biggest exporter of black tea and supplier of more than a third of the cut flowers sold in the European Union.