Dangote Group plans to invest an additional $45 billion across refinery expansion, liquefied natural gas infrastructure and regional industrial projects as part of an ambitious strategy to raise annual revenue to $100 billion and eventually hit $200 billion by 2030.
President of the group, Aliko Dangote, disclosed this during a recent interview with Nicolai Tangen, chief executive officer of the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund.
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The African billionaire explained that the company is entering a new growth phase driven by exports, refining and gas.
He said the current refinery would be more than doubled within 30 months, lifting capacity to 1.4 million barrels per day from its current level.
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“We are more than doubling the refinery. In the next 30 months, we’ll be at 1.4 million, which is huge,” he said.
Beyond refining, the company is also planning a 12-million-tonne LNG project and new refinery investments across East Africa, including Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya.
“We have now, as a group, we have $45 billion to spend,” Mr Dangote said.
He explained that the investment programme also includes gas infrastructure to capture and process flared gas from Nigeria’s southern and eastern regions and transport it westward for LNG production.
“We’re doing LNG in Nigeria. We’re doing a gas infrastructure to remove all the gas we are flaring… bringing it to the west where we are setting up an LNG plant,” he said.
According to him, the expansion strategy is backed by a financial model built around export earnings and stronger investor participation.
He said 80 per cent of group revenue is expected to be dollar-based, reducing foreign exchange risks and strengthening dividend payments.
The billionaire said the group recorded about $3 billion in Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortisation (EBITDA) last year but is targeting more than $30 billion by 2030.
“Last year our EBITDA was $3 billion. But the target by 2030 is to be 10 times that amount. It is to be at over $30 billion of EBITDA,” he said.
He added that cement production would also rise to 100 million tonnes as part of the group’s broader industrial push.
Mr Dangote said the expansion would eventually support a market valuation of more than $200 billion while helping the company reach its long-term $200 billion revenue ambition.
“So we’ll be able to actually fund this $45 billion, which will eventually take us to $100 billion of revenue because our target is to get $200 billion by 2030,” he said.
He said the company’s philosophy remains simple: think big or risk not growing at all.
“If you think big, you grow big. When you think small, you don’t grow at all,” he said.
Crude oil production
Last month, the Dangote Petroleum Refinery announced that it recorded its first oil from upstream assets and is set to begin pumping marketable crude in the coming weeks, as the company moves to secure supply for its sprawling refinery near Lagos.
READ ALSO: Dangote rejects NNPC’s bid for bigger refinery stake, pushes for wider ownership
“We have opened a well and begun standard testing, which should be completed in the next three to four weeks,” the Vice President of Dangote’s oil and gas division, Devakumar Edwin, said at the time.
He noted that large-scale pumping and fresh drilling campaigns would follow shortly after.
The development marks a significant step in Dangote’s gradual expansion into upstream oil production, complementing its refining and logistics operations.
The company is currently producing about 4,500 barrels per day from the Kalaekule field on Oil Mining Lease (OML) 72, following a delayed start-up in December 2025.
Production is projected to rise to 15,000 barrels per day within weeks, according to Olajumoke Ajayi, chief executive of West African Exploration and Production (WAEP), Dangote’s upstream joint venture.
Dangote holds an 85 per cent stake in WAEP, which has a 45 per cent working interest in OML 71 and 72. The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) holds the remaining stake, while First E&P operates the assets.
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