As Nigeria seek for sufficient crude oil production to salvage her domestic refineries consumption and industrial stakeholder calling for all encompassing efforts to forestall unforeseen shortage in supply, the recent OPEC release as placed Nigeria in a top spot of being the current crude oil producer in Africa ahead of its competitor Angola.
According to OPEC, the price of OPEC basket of thirteen crudes stood at $84.27 a barrel on Wednesday, compared with $86.50 the previous day, according to OPEC Secretariat calculations
Nigeria has previously in May regained its position as the top crude oil producer in Africa as announced by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) producing about 1.184 million barrels of crude oil per day during in the month under review comparison with Libya producing 1.158 million barrels per day, Angola producing 1.111 million barrels per day, and Algeria producing 962,000 barrels per day.
In April 2023, Nigeria experienced its first decline in crude oil production, with OPEC reporting a daily output of 999,000 barrels. But with respect to current OPEC release on member crude oil production, Nigeria has occupied the top position she regained in May 2023 still trailing by arch-rival Angola.
Current OPEC figures show that Nigeria is regaining its status as Africa’s top oil producer- as indicated in secondary sources in the OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report (MOMR), in November, Nigeria and Angola produced 1.692 million barrels per day of oil each, while by primary sources, Nigeria produced 1.782 million barrels of oil per day against Angola’s 1.688 million barrels per day. Based on this data, which is based on direct communication, Nigeria produced approximately 90,000 barrels per day more than Angola in November. Nigeria is expecting her four refineries with total capacity of 450,000 barrels per day which are currently undergoing quick fix to come onstream in December, while the 650,000 barrels per day Dangote Refinery is also expected to stream its maiden crude oil processing soon. But the country current crude oil production will have little left for export if all the total refineries feed stock is source locally.
