The first shipment of Sudanese ethanol has left port bound for Rotterdam. The country’s first export shipment of 5 million liters of ethanol to the EU was sold at approximately €450 a cubic meter, officials from the Kenana Sugar Co. said.
“Yesterday a vessel carrying 5 million liters of ethanol went to Rotterdam,” said company secretary Fareed Omer Medani. “This has been purchased by the European Union," he said. Medani added that an additional 20 million liters would be exported in four separate shipments before the end of February.
The Kenana ethanol plant, built by Brazilian firm Dedini Industrias de Base, was inaugurated earlier this year and aims to produce 65 million liters per year.
Kenana’s Managing Director Mohamed El Mardi told Reuters the price per cubic meter for the December shipment was about €450 FOB. But he said prices for the four further shipments would vary, depending on the market.
"The prices are not fixed prices," he said. "For the five shipments we will have 5 different prices — January/February prices are higher than in December."
The Kenana head said that the plant’s capacity will rise over the next few years eventually hitting 200 million liters by 2013.