FG targets deep offshore fields as it looks to raise production to 3mbpd
The federal government has announced plans to raise daily crude production to three million barrels.
It further unveiled key areas that will help realise its transformation agenda in the oil and gas industry.
One of the critical measures is ensuring the conclusion of work and the immediate passage of the Petroleum Industry Governance Bill (PIGB) to facilitate deep water exploration.
The minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva, stated this when he enumerated his ministry’s deliverables on which the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and other departments and agencies under his watch, should take a cue.
In a presentation at the commencement of a two-day “Next Level Strategic Retreat” of the minister for directors in the ministry and heads of agencies under his purview, Sylva listed the priority areas as the Implementation of the reduction of federal government’s equity in the Joint Venture (JV) to 40 per cent; curbing cross border leakages of petroleum products; completion of gas flare commercialidation; increasing crude oil production to three million barrels per day, and effecting reduction in the cost of crude oil production by at least five per cent.
NNPC group general manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Mr. Ndu Ughamadu, quoted the minister in a statement he issued, as listing the aggressive promotion of the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB); promotion of inland basin exploration activities as well as the promotion of deep offshore exploration activities as the federal government’s priorities.
The key areas also include collaboration with the private sector to aggressively increase domestic refining capacity and working assiduously to support President Muhammadu Buhari to achieve his target of lifting 10 million of Nigerians out of poverty via job creation.
Sylva told heads of the agencies that at the end of the retreat they would be required to collectively sign an undertaking to deliver on the set targets, adding that they must execute the mandate with all the seriousness it deserves.
In his response, the group managing director of the NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari, expressed the readiness of the corporation to align the corporation with the spirit and letter of the key priority areas, stressing that as the main enabler of the Nigerian economy, the NNPC would work with other agencies of the ministry to achieve the set goals.
He said that the coming of Sylva as minister promises to engender high level Inter-agencies collaboration across all tiers of the sector.
The heads of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB), Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF), the Department of Petroleum Resource (DPR), and Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA), pledged their support for the minister.
Source: Leadership
