Nigeria could hit 2.2 million barrels per day in 2023, without the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) oil production quota rationing, Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC), Mele Kyari, has said.
However, Kyari who was speaking at the virtual Global UAE Energy Forum, said despite all odds, the country aims to produce 1.8 million bpd this year.
Last month, the NNPC put Nigeria’s daily oil production at 1.59 million bpd, a Bloomberg survey pegged it at 1.35 million bpd, while the industry regulator, the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) data revealed a 1.235 million bpd volume, excluding condensates.
But when condensates which are outside OPEC’s calculation are added, the figure released by the NUPRC in its latest crude oil and condensate production data for December 2022, rocketed to 1.413 million bpd.
Although still significantly lower than the roughly 1.8 million bpd OPEC allocation to Nigeria, it showed that crude oil production increased from 1.18 million bpd in November.
The output will be the highest production level since March 2022 when the country’s production averaged 1.237 million bpd.
Nigeria has been unable to meet its OPEC production quota for over a year, thereby hobbling the country’s main source of foreign exchange and putting immense pressure on the local currency, the naira, against the American dollar.
But Kyari admitted that Nigeria struggled to achieve its OPEC quota in 2022, stressing that the country had a “different challenge” from the rest of the world, as security issues undermined production.
“For us, we see a trajectory of restoring production, including condensates within the year definitely. And we believe that we can hit our target of 2.2 million barrels per day, although now our OPEC target is 1.8 million barrels per day. We know that it’s practical to do 2.2 million barrels per day.
“We took definite steps to increase production and this is paying off. Around July, our net crude oil excluding condensate came down to around 1million bpd. That has been restored,” Kyari said.
According to him, the government has also taken very practical steps around pipeline security.
In August 2022, a high-ranking federal government delegation struck a deal with a former militant-turned security contractor, Government Ekpemupolo, also known as Tompolo, to crack down on oil theft.
“It’s practical to hit 2.2 million bpd in 2023, this is practical. It’s a moving target,” Kyari said, adding that: “There are a number of projects that I have clear line of sight that can come on board in 2023.”
