OpeOluwani Akintayo
28 March 2018, Sweetcrude, Lagos — Nigeria’s crude oil production grew to a total of 1.732 million barrels per day in February, data obtained from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC’s Monthly Oil Market Report, MOMR for March disclosed.
The country’s output grew to 1.732 million bpd in February, compared to 1,641million bpd reported in January.
Once output reaches 1.8m bpd, Nigeria will join the OPEC’s cut deal.
The country produced between 2.2-2.8 million barrels per day before commencement of the oil cut deal.
As at December, the country’s output was pegged at 1.569 million bpd based on direct communication from either the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation or Department of Petroleum Resources.
However, as usual, there seems to be a disparity in figures obtained by OPEC from direct sources and that from secondary sources.
The figure for Nigeria’s crude oil output obtained by OPEC from secondary sources said the country’s output already surpassed 1.8m bpd as at February.
According to secondary sources, Nigeria produced a total of 1,806m bpd in February.
Nigeria alongside Libya, have been exempted twice from OPEC’s oil cut deal which started in January 2017.
Nigeria’s exemption was due to disruption in oil production caused by spates of attacks on oil installations by militants in the Niger Delta.
The country’s Minister of States for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu had also blamed production drop on aging pipelines and moribund refineries.
Both Saudi Arabia and Russia currently shoulder the highest cut since the start of the deal which has seen oil prices rise to $71 per barrel in January.
OPEC and its partners agreed to cut a combined 1.8m bpd of production in November 2016.
The agreement had been extended twice now until the end of 2018.
However, OPEC is looking at extending the deal beyond this year.
