BRENT, the crude used to price Nigerian oil, surpassed the $105/barrel mark yesterday, reaching its highest level in over 14 years, following the current war in Ukraine, which was invaded by neighboring Russia.
Nigeria’s National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) pledged yesterday to raise oil production in order to benefit from the rising crude oil price, despite the country’s recent failure to meet its OPEC crude oil production quota.
OPEC increased Nigeria’s crude oil production target for March early last month, despite the country’s failure to meet its authorized monthly output targets.
Nigeria missed its crude oil output target for January, pumping 1.46 million barrels per day against an OPEC-approved target of 1.683 million barrels per day.
Since the conflict in Ukraine began, the price of crude oil (Brent) has risen steadily, reaching $106.27/barrel yesterday rising by $8.3 or 8.47 percent over the previous day’s price.
Mele Kyari, the Group Managing Director of NNPC, promised that the oil business would raise Nigeria’s oil production during the ongoing Nigeria International Energy Summit 2022 in Abuja.
He said, “We must clear the resources of today and sustain the transition through some form of resilience until we get to 2060.
“And the easiest way to clear the wealth of today so that we can have the resources that will keep us through this transition is to immediately increase domestic crude oil production. There is no other way to do it.”
Kyari added, “We have challenges today, we have made losses but we are doing something about the security situation in our areas of operations.
“You will see the impacts and effects very soon and the industry will continue to rely on the production that will come from those places.”
