From Business Standard

Uganda, sitting on a “pile of uranium,” is seeking India’s knowhow to develop its reserves and open up new vistas of energy cooperation between historically linked countries, a visiting Ugandan minister has said.

Ephraim Kwamuntu, Ugandan minister of water and environment, said his country was keen on mutually beneficial cooperation with India to develop energy resources.

“Uganda is sitting on a pile of uranium, for instance, and Indian knowhow would be very useful in accessing this,” Kwamuntu told IANS in an interview. “We have uranium, oil and gas. Here, India with its knowhow and expertise can help,” he added.

Explaining that Uganda had to increase manifold its energy generation capacity to achieve the status of a middle-income country, Kwamuntu said India had a lot to offer in this regard.

“The sun is directly overhead in equatorial Africa, yet in Uganda only 14 percent of the population has access to electricity. The remaining 86 percent go to bed with sunset. What would you expect about this population,” the minister asked rhetorically.

Uganda has been in talks with India about accessing its uranium reserves and for India training its engineers in this area. Uganda’s planning minister had earlier led a business delegation to India that held talks with the Confederation of Indian Industry on developing Uganda’s uranium sector, among others.

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