Also speaking, Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, who disclosed that with NNPC inclusive, Excess of N1 trillion was paid for fuel subsidy in 2015, with plans to move fuel price from N87 to N97 per litre in 2016 as well as total removal of fuel subsidy next year.
On the issue of daily oil production target, Kachikwu said, “From August this year, we have been exceeding two million daily production through stringent monitoring of our production by getting quick fixes to instances of pipelines breaking. The internal projection for our system next year is in excess of 2.4 million which is coming from enhanced and increased production from NPDC field.
“A lot of efficiency had really been applied in this regard. NPDC will for instance be producing 300, 000 barrels on its own while other partners would process at least 2.2m barrels. We would address issues of security and other impediments to the realization of our target. We are looking at a collective and holistic handling of security issues between the NNPC and the oil majors with us taking the lead.
On the oil price benchmark of $38, he said: “The projection at OPEC was along the line of the fact that once we do not interfere in term of production cost will lead to a southward movement in terms of pricing. We expect an increase as from early January when we expect it to go up by $45 to $50 per barrel in spite of OPEC projection. We expect it to hit $70 per barrel in 2017.”
Vanguard.
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