Oscarline Onwuemenyi,
with agency reports
08 December 2016, Sweetcrude, Abuja – Nigeria’s Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, on Wednesday spoke of the country’s ambitious expectation for oil to rise to $60 per barrel by the end of March 2017.
Nigeria is desperately seeking to bolster revenues and reverse a severe foreign exchange crisis brought about by a recession which followed a plunge in oil price to $37 early last year.
Kachikwu, who spoke on the sidelines of a meeting of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries with non-OPEC oil producers in Abu Dhabi, said Nigeria was also hoping to raise oil production from 1.6m bpd to 1.8m b/d and move up to 2m b/d as quickly as possible.
Speaking in an interview with Bloomberg, he said, “We are hoping to achieve at least 600 barrels. Initial indications are showing almost a deal on 400 (000b/d). We are still working the numbers. Fourteen countries coming to Vienna, non-OPEC countries. So, we are optimistic. We need to take out as much as we can but we need to be in a position where both OPEC and non-OPEC members are bearing the brunt for this activism.”
He said though Nigeria was looking at 1.8m b/d, it could be as high as 2m bpd “when you then add on some of the volumes that are going to be due to natural declines, due to step downs for purposes of repair works in rigs, you are probably going to hit the 2m barrels number.”
He said Nigeria had decided to watch developments in the global oil sector over the next six months, warning, however, that it was not expecting anything “dramatic” to happen overnight even if shale producers increase their production.
he called on all oil producers to work together to control output and adopt a more realistic price. He added that things had changed from when the market was predictable to a situation where nothing could be taken for granted anymore.
On Nigeria’s expectations about the oil price, Kachikwu said, “We are hoping to do better. We are hoping to get closer to $60 towards the latter part of Quarter 1. If the momentum that we see today keeps up and if the parties remain disciplined to the course that they have committed to.”
Last week, OPEC agreed to exclude Nigeria and Libya from production cuts due to security threats being encountered in their respective oil sectors.