Edible oil refining and PET preforms in Somalia

Where Xidig members may contribute

Service, supplier and research openings, not confirmed contracts or tenders:

• Supply chains: sourcing crude oil or PET resin, and the port, storage and customs work either plant would need.
• Distribution: local cooking-oil packing and distribution to retailers.
• Local oilseeds: sesame and groundnut sourcing, and support for farmers, if a plant would crush local seed.
• Recycling: collecting used PET bottles for recyclers.
• Research: market studies for cooking oil and bottled water, which the sheets don't cite.

Possible services, research, supplier or collaboration roles

• Market study: cooking-oil use by household type, and bottled-water volumes in Mogadishu.
• Food-safety and labelling capacity for locally refined or packed oil.
• Preform supply agreements with existing bottlers, if a plant goes ahead.
• PET collection linked to existing recyclers.

Who may find this useful

• Food technologists and quality-control specialists.
• Chemical and process engineers.
• Importers, traders and logistics firms.
• Water-bottling businesses.
• Plastics and recycling entrepreneurs.
• Agronomists working on oilseeds.

What the trade data and market evidence show

Cooking oil imports. Somalia doesn't publish its own trade figures, so the best check is what other countries report sending there. For refined palm oil (HS 151190), partners reported:

Xidig's sums of World Bank WITS partner-reported exports to Somalia. They include re-exports through the UAE, Oman and Djibouti, and miss informal trade.

Trade partners reported about US$271M of refined palm oil shipped to Somalia in 2022. The government's US$186M is closer to the 2021 total.

Partners reported no crude palm oil (HS 151110) shipped to Somalia in 2022, which fits the government's point that nothing is refined locally. Sunflower oil added about US$16.6M in 2022, mostly from Turkey.

How much oil people use. FAO-based data put Somalia's vegetable oil supply at about 5.8 kg per person in 2021 and 4.7 kg in 2022. Xidig's own estimate from import records is higher: palm and sunflower oil imports in 2022 came to about 186,000 tonnes, or roughly 10 kg per person, about 11 litres. For comparison, the same FAO-based data give about 8 kg in Kenya and about 12 kg as the world average (2023). Either way, the government's figure of 20–75 litres a year is well above what the evidence suggests.

Is there really no refinery? Xidig found no palm-oil refinery in Mogadishu. Elsewhere:

• Berbera: an edible-oil company sells refined palm olein and sunflower oil from its plant in Berbera, without saying whether it refines them itself. A UAE-based food company announced a "300,000-square-foot packing facility" in Berbera's economic zone in 2022. That is packing, not refining.
• Sesame oil: small traditional mills press sesame in Mogadishu. Somalia's proposal to FAO's Hand-in-Hand investment forum in 2025 includes a sesame oil processing factory, which suggests none exists at scale.

Local oilseeds. The "extraction" half of the proposal would need local crops. FAO data show Somalia's sesame harvest swinging from about 36,000 tonnes a year (2017–2019) to under 5,000 tonnes in 2021, then about 28,000 tonnes in 2023 and 17,000 tonnes in 2024. A plant relying on local seed would face that volatility.

Bottled water and preforms. Xidig could not verify "over twenty large water filling companies" or "800,000 preforms daily", and found no water companies' union. The claim that bottlers already have blowing machines is supported: in 2025 one Mogadishu water company financed "an automatic blow molding machine with a preform auto feeder" and "5.65 million preforms and caps" (Shuraako, April 2025). Xidig found no preform or bottle plant in Somalia.

Plastic imports. Recorded imports of plastic bottles, preforms and similar containers (HS 392330, a wider category) were about US$5.9M and about 3,100 tonnes in 2023, mostly from the UAE. At 12–20 g each, 800,000 preforms a day would weigh about 3,500–5,800 tonnes a year. That is more than all recorded imports in the category, so either the demand figure is high or much of the trade isn't recorded (Xidig's rough calculation). Recorded PET resin imports were only about US$49,000 in 2022, so a preform plant would need a new resin supply.

Industrial zones and incentives. The sheets cite "existing industrial zones". The US government's 2025 investment climate statement says "Somalia does not currently operate any officially designated free trade zones or special economic zones under national law". It also says a national investment incentives framework "remains in draft form and has not yet been adopted". The legal basis for the sheets' five-year tax exemption is not stated.

Plastic ban. The February 2024 ban covers plastic bags, not PET bottles. PET recycling links this proposal to Mogadishu's waste: collection, recycling and waste-to-energy.

Geographic context

Both plants would be in or near Mogadishu, close to the port. The refinery sheet cites "Proximity to potential port site", and neither sheet names a site. Other edible-oil activity found by Xidig is in Berbera.

Dependencies and implementation constraints

• Raw materials: imported crude palm oil or local oilseeds for the refinery; imported PET resin for the preforms.
• Power: both plants need reliable, affordable electricity (see Why electricity costs so much in Somalia).
• Food-safety standards for refined oil.
• Competition with established importers of refined oil.
• Legal basis for the stated tax exemption, and the absence of designated economic zones.

Risks and unknowns

• Demand figures: the consumption range and the preform figure are unsourced and look high against trade data.
• Return claims on both sheets have no stated basis.
• Status: the PET sheet ticks "Feasibility Completed", but the study is not cited.
• Copy error: the refinery sheet's contact email belongs to the Ministry of Education.

Questions members should verify before acting

1. Who is the private investor behind each proposal, and what has SOMINVEST agreed with them?
2. Where is the PET feasibility study, and can it be shared?
3. Would the refinery process imported crude palm oil, local oilseeds or both?
4. What is the source for "800,000 preforms daily" and "over twenty large water filling companies"?
5. Under which law would the five-year tax exemption apply?
6. Where is the "existing industrial zone" the sheets refer to?

What is confirmed, and what isn't

Confirmed

• The two proposals, their printed costs, promoters and stages.
• Partner-reported refined palm oil exports to Somalia: about US$182M (2021), US$271M (2022) and US$202M (2023). No crude palm oil was recorded in 2022.
• Existing blow-moulding machines at a Mogadishu water company (2025).
• The announced edible-oil packing plant in Berbera (2022).
• No officially designated economic zones under national law (US government, 2025).

Our interpretation

• Cooking-oil demand is large, but the government's own consumption figure is unreliable.
• Raw-material supply is the main risk for both plants.

Not yet verified

• Any source for the 20–75 litre consumption range.
• The number of large water companies and daily preform demand.
• Whether any plant in Somalia refines oil rather than packing it.
• The PET feasibility study.

Relevant next steps

• Follow SOMINVEST and the Ministry of Commerce and Industry for news of these projects and of the investment incentives framework.
• If you import cooking oil or run a bottling business, compare the booklet's demand figures with your own.
• Share market knowledge through Xidig, without sharing commercially sensitive data.