Oil Production Shrinks Again, Threatens 2mbpd Target

Nigeria’s ambition to raise daily oil production to over two million barrels has suffered another setback as crude output declined again in May 2025. According to data from the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), the country’s daily oil production fell from 1.68 million barrels per day in April to 1.65 million barrels in May. Crude oil alone dropped from 1.48 million barrels per day to 1.45 million barrels, signaling a reversal of the modest gains recorded earlier in the year.

This decline comes after production rose from 1.40mbpd in March to 1.48mbpd in April, giving hope that the country was on track to meet its 2.1 million barrels per day target. However, the May drop has cast doubt on Nigeria’s ability to sustain a consistent upward trend in crude output. The NUPRC stated that the highest and lowest combined crude and condensate production in May were 1.810 million barrels and 1.61 million barrels per day, respectively, with an average of 1,657,435 barrels per day. Of this, 1,452,941 barrels were crude oil, and 204,493 barrels were condensates.

Despite the challenges, the average crude oil production still stood at 97 per cent of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) quota of 1.5 million barrels per day for Nigeria. President Bola Tinubu, upon appointing the new board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) in May, charged them with raising production to two million barrels daily by 2027 and three million barrels by 2030. The new NNPC leadership, headed by Chairman Ahmadu Kida and Group Chief Executive Officer Bayo Ojulari, was also tasked with increasing gas production to 8 billion cubic feet daily by 2027 and 10 billion cubic feet by 2030. Additionally, Tinubu expects NNPC’s refining output to reach 200,000 barrels per day by 2027 and 500,000 barrels per day by 2030.

Ojulari, speaking during the board’s inauguration, said the company had begun optimizing operations, including refinery maintenance. He claimed oil production had already increased from 1.5 million to 1.7 million barrels in two months, with a target of reaching 1.9 million barrels by the end of the year. “We will promise what we can deliver, and we will deliver on our promise,” he stated.

Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, has consistently said that Nigeria has the capacity to produce three million barrels of oil daily. In January, the country’s daily crude production stood at 1,538,697 barrels—approximately 39,000 barrels above OPEC’s set quota. The government started 2025 positively, with production rising from 1.4mbpd in December 2024 to 1.5mbpd in January. The total output, including condensates, reached 1.74mbpd in January. However, production began to dip again in February and has not returned to January’s peak.

Nigeria has repeatedly failed to meet its OPEC quota throughout 2022, 2023, and 2024. While recent efforts by the Tinubu administration have shown signs of improvement, the May decline reflects ongoing challenges in the oil sector, including infrastructure issues, oil theft, and operational inefficiencies. Without significant and sustained improvements, the country’s ambitious production targets may remain out of reach.