Nigeria’s Increasing Oil Production: June Update

According to the Monthly Oil Market Report for June by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), quoting direct sources, Nigeria’s oil production for June is 1.276mbpd.

The country’s oil production had fallen from 1.28mbpd in April to 1.25mbpd in May. However, secondary sources from OPEC relay a different figure, disclosing that the figure dropped from 1.37mbpd in May to 1.36mbpd in June.

Mele Kyari, the Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited, previously noted that crude production was inching closer to 1.7mbpd in May, as seen in the Nigerian newspaper, The Punch.

“As of today’s data, we’re inching to 1.7mbpd. We won’t celebrate this. On 17th of April 2020, our production, without doing anything, without drilling new wells, shot to 2.2mbpd. The difference was COVID-19. The thieves, the vandals, everybody went to sleep,” he stated at the time (May).

May’s decline followed a troubling trend from the start of the year, when Nigeria’s oil production fell from 1.427mbpd in January to 1.322mbpd in February, according to direct sources.

Production also fell in March, going from from 1.32 million barrels per day in February to 1.23 million barrels per day in March.

Questions from stakeholders regarding the loss of revenue as a result of the government’s inability to boost production contributed to the continuous decline. The NNPC disclosed that it has placed oil production under a state of emergency.

“We have decided to stop the debate. We have declared war on the challenges affecting our crude oil production. War means war. We have the right tools. We know what to fight. We know what we have to do at the level of assets. We have engaged our partners. And we will work together to improve the situation,” the group’s head stated.