Nigerian oil and gas sector achieves targets

Nigeria's oil and gas industry is on course to achieving targets and objectives set by the federal government. Chief Ombu Harry, group executive director, Finance and Accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) gave the information in London at a two-day conference on financing oil and gas projects in Africa.
The targets include:
-- increasing the hydrocarbon reserve from the current 28.4 bn barrels to 40 bn barrels by 2010;
-- oil production capacity from 2.25 mm bpd to 4 mm by 2010 and
-- elimination of gas flaring by 2008.
He said the industry had already achieved the target on oil reserve at 30 bn barrels, while the gas reserve had increased from 116 tcf to 159 tcf.

Stressing the importance of oil and gas industry in Nigeria, Ombu said it accounted for more than 80 % of government revenue, constituted more than 95 % of the country's total exports, and provided more than 90 % of the country's foreign exchange earnings. The executive director said the sector provided job opportunities to the teeming population of graduates and school leavers.
He added that the industry brings into the country "new frontier technologies and links the country to the outside world even in the worst periods in the political history of the nation." "The oil and gas industry has attracted more foreign investment than other sectors combined," he said, and expressed the hope that the conference would result in more investors being informed of investment opportunities in Nigeria and Africa in general.

Ombu, however, noted that financing oil and gas projects in Africa and Nigeria in particular, had become more topical at various international fora, and attributed the situation to a conducive environment in the continent brought about by the changes in governance in various countries.
He urged genuine investors to take advantage of the incentives, conducive environment and stable policy provided by the present administration to invest in Nigeria.