The BICC research project “Socio-economic repercussions of Chinese oil investments in South Sudan”, which is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Development and Cooperation (BMZ), analyzes the consequences of oil production at the local level in Melut County, Upper Nile State. During a four-week field research, two BICC researchers studied the community development projects of the oil consortium Petrodar Operational Company PDOC—of which Chinese and Malaysian parastatals hold the majority of shares—and interviewed the local population, chiefs, state officials, managers of the oil consortium and politicians about the positive and negative effects of oil production.