The Federal Government has expressed optimism that the country would achieve its daily oil production target of three million barrels soon despite significant challenges posed by oil theft and pipeline vandalism.
The country’s production figures released by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, NUPRC, for the month of November 2022 was 1.2 million barrels per day.
But speaking in Abuja, the Minister of State Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva, explained that the Federal Government was working to ensure that all local and international oil companies return to full capacity production of crude oil in the country.
Chief Sylva who spoke when he receives the Head of Sub-Saharan Africa Region of Eni SpA Mr Mario Bello, said the government would continue to work to improve security of pipelines and other oil installations in the country.
Oil production in the country has drastically been cut down by oil companies due to massive vandalism of pipelines by oil thieves.
The decisions of the oil companies have affected the volume of daily crude productions and which has unfortunately led to revenue loss for the country.
Sylva restated the Federal Government’s readiness to continue to improve security along the tracks of the major crude oil pipelines and block every leakage through which crude oil are stolen by oil thieves and pipeline vandals.
“I am happy to hear from you (Eni) that you have increased your crude oil production to 15,000 barrels per day as a result of the efforts of the government in protecting the pipelines in the region. I assure you that this trend will continue,” the minister said.
Sylva added that the desire of the Federal Government is to “see all the oil majors in the country return to their full production capacity to boost revenue for the government” and also to help the country meet its Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC, obligations.
“We will continue to work to bring stability and build confidence for everyone to return to the field to produce their maximum capacity,” the minister added.
He said the Federal Government with these efforts is targeting full production capacity of up to three million daily crude oil production.
In his remarks, Mr Bello, said that the renewed confidence in the Federal Government’s efforts in restoring sanity along the major crude oil pipelines in the Niger Delta has enabled the company to increase crude oil production from a near zero production level to about 15,000 barrels per day in the last one month.
“We are happy that the security situation is improving and we will be willing to be back fully,” Bello said, adding that as at last month, the company cried to the minister over the vandalization and theft of their products, noting that the situation has greatly improved.
“At a point we were producing almost nothing but today, with the improved security situation along the pipelines, we are able to produce and export about 15,000 barrels of crude oil and if this trend continues, we will be able to reach our 30,000 barrels crude oil production,” he disclosed.
Bello said with the renewed confidence the company has in the security of the crude oil pipelines, Eni was willing to reopen its planned investments in the gas and power sector, noting that the company was happy with the support from the government in terms of business cooperation.
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