OpeOluwani Akintayo
15 April 2018, Sweetcrude, Lagos — Nigeria’s crude oil production dropped by 46,000 barrels per day in March.
According to statistics of the Oragnisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC’s Monthly Oil Market Report, MOMR for April, as provided by direct source (either the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, or the Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR), the country reported an output of 1, 686 million barrels per day for March, down from 1,732m bpd reported for February.
However, OPEC said statistics supplied by secondary sources pegged the country’s production for March at 1,810m bpd.
Nigeria had reported a production of 1,641m b/d reported for January.
The understanding is that once output reaches 1,800bpd, 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.
Nigeria alongside Libya, have been exempted twice from OPEC’s oil cut deal which kick-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.
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 1.8mbp/d 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.
