Federal Govt seeks more investment in oil refining

Vice President Namadi Sambo said at the weekend that decreasing oil sales to the United States have provided the opportunity to create jobs by building refineries and developing markets closer home.

Nigeria, a major member of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), lacks refining capacity and depends on imported fuel to meet domestic demand.

Nigeria’s position as Africa’s biggest crude producer is threatened by Angola whose oil output is at par with what Nigeria produces.

For the first time since 2009, Nigeria’s shipments to the U.S. slid to 194,000 barrels a day in February, the lowest in more than 18 years, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

“Part of our policy now, as a result of this, is that we’re attracting more foreign direct investment in processing the crude oil in Nigeria,” Sambo said told reporters in Yokohama, Japan. “That creates more jobs, and it creates wealth within the country.”

The U.S. is Nigeria’s biggest crude buyer, importing cargoes valued at 724 billion naira ($4.6 billion) in the fourth quarter of last year stated the National Bureau of Statistics. The U.S. imports from Nigeria rebounded in March to 376,000 barrels a day, according to EIA data published May 30.

Sambo is in Japan for the Tokyo International Conference on African Development, the largest African development forum outside the continent.

Angola is poised to overtake Nigeria as the continent’s top producer of crude as oil thieves sabotage pipelines in the oil-rich Niger River delta. Nigeria pumped 1.87 million barrels a day in May, the same as Angola, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Both belong to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

International producers including Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA), Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. (CVX), Total SA (FP) and Eni SpA (ENI) — in joint ventures with the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. – pump about 90 per cent of the country’s output.