The Federal Government has expressed determination to increase its oil production to four million barrels per day capacity despite the current OPEC quota of 1.4mbpd for member countries.
The Minister of State Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva made this known on Monday in his speech during the opening of the 2021 Nigeria International Petroleum Summit, NIPS, where he disclosed that last week’s marginal oil field licencing award would push Nigeria towards its production target.
He called for collaboration in the industry, to reduce cost and logistics to meet the target.
“This year’s NIPS comes on the eve of the award of new marginal field licences after several failed attempts over the past 20 years.
“I am personally delighted, this is because getting these new set of marginal fields off the ground is definitely a stepping stone towards achieving the country’s aspiration of meeting the target of four million barrels per day oil production and 40 billion of proven reserve.
“I have known that the country is now on the right path to achieve that dream. It is true that the industry has been overwhelmed by unprecedented crisis as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, ” he said.
The minister pointed out that despite the ongoing energy transition across the globe, hydrocarbon resources would continue to lead energy sector in the nearest future saying Nigeria would continue to ensure conducive business environment for the industry players.
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“Hydrocarbons have provided the majority of the world’s energy for centuries and that fact is not going to change all of a sudden.
“I am yet to see that disruptive technology that has great flexibility, affordability and applicability to replace oil and gas immediately.
“However, Nigeria is on track in moving its economy to cleaner energy sources in the area of renewables, gas currently serving as the bridge to achieving that. he added. For me, the new approach is collaboration. That is the paradigm shift I want to focus on at this summit. I know that collaboration had been a buzzword in the oil and gas industry for years.
But the industry has equally paid lip service to it” he stated.
Earlier, the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari suffered that the industry is going through challenges ranging from energy transition to COVID-19 induced challenges. But said locally, the government is working to address the challenges facing the industry in the country.
“We are also aware that cost is everything in the future. The crisis has thrown up the fact that only the best of producers will survive and therefore cost control become a major issue in the industry.
“Funding also is a major issue in the industry today for two reasons. One, there is paucity of resources across the globe and secondly, there is overall reluctance by investing companies and banks to put money into fossil fuels related businesses.
“But obviously these are issues we have to live with however the best of the businesses that will survive are the ones that try to transit into climate-friendly businesses”, he said.
The Enterprise managing Director of Huawei Technologies Company Nigeria Limited, Michael Zhuang, a major sponsor of the Summit, in his speech during the opening of the technical session said Huawei is dedicated to promoting digital transformation and reducing the digital gap in all industries.
“Thank you all very much for choosing to participate in this special forum hosted by Huawei called “Drive Data to Barrel”.
“In Nigeria, we have partnered with both International and local oil companies in Upstream, middle stream and downstream to promote Oil & Gas digital transformation and we remain committed to continuously provide our support and innovation, ” he said.
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