3 August 2005
The Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr Edmund Daukoru has lamented that despite huge government investment, oil production has plateaued at 2.45milion barrels per day (mbpd) against a build up of about 3.0mpbd.
The minister noted that one reason for this situation was disinvestment by joint venture (JV) operators in oil development as opposed to gas.
Dr Daukoru in a lead paper delivered at the 29th society of petroleum engineers' (SPE) annual conference and exhibition (NIAC 2000) which has its theme, "Nigeria petroleum industry and challenges in the first quarter of the 21st century", said he expected NNPC and its JV partners to take immediate steps to rebalance this trend and ensure that investment earmarked for oil go only to oil while a suitable commercial platform be found for gas.
The minister also regretted that the dwindling oil activities in the traditional areas of the Delta have not helped Nigeria to fully take advantage of the high global demand for oil and charged all operators whom government has assigned acreages to work them actively to avail the country the full opportunities offered by rising global demand.
"On its part, government would seriously focus on ensuring that all the acreages are actively worked for the mutual benefit of the industry and the nation", Daukoru assured.
The minister also lamented that unlike oil, there was no collated figure of or programme for actual and anticipated addition in the gas sector since 2003 when the National gas reserves base was stated at 187 thousands cubic feet (tcf) split roughly on equal basis between associated and non-associated gas.
He therefore called for an in-debth industry wide gas reserve audit to be conducted if we are not to permanently lose both our credibility and customers eager to do business with us.
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