Nigeria is set to miss out on crude price windfall as the country’s output declined to 1.29 million barrels per day (bpd) in July.
This decline in output was contained in data obtained from Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC Limited) the state-owned oil regulatory agency.
The data released by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission show that oil production fell 12.56 percent from 1.48 million bpd in June this year and by 1.52 percent from 1.31 million bpd on a year-on-year basis.
On average, crude oil production for the month was 1.08 million bpd, while blended and unblended condensates were 38,258 and 174,509 bpd respectively.
A major cause of the decline was the temporary shutting of the Forcados terminal last month. According to the report, production dropped by 58.4 percent to 3.29 million bpd from 7.9 million bpd in June.
Brent crude, the international oil benchmark, increased from $74.51 per barrel to $89.31 per barrel in July.
“We are back to our conundrum. We must drive a sustainable strategy in our oil and gas sector to take the wins,” said Jide Pratt, chief operating officer of Aiona and country manager of Trade Grid.
He said Nigeria must ensure zero loss of oil through theft and inefficiencies now as prices remain high.
“We must hold oil rigs to higher standards of tracking and measuring what is actually produced. No waste at this time,” he said.
