By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria’s crude oil output sank yet again in April 2024 to around 1.18 million barrels per day, according to secondary data from Reuters.
The platform said Nigerian production declined with exports falling more sharply according to some ship trackers as the Dangote refinery took in more cargoes.
Also, an outage briefly affected the Bonny production stream.
This means Nigeria’s hope of substantially meeting its Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) quota has once again been dashed.
Nigeria’s crude production in January stood at 1.42 million barrels per day but fell to 1.32 million barrels per day in February and then to 1.23 million barrels per day in March 2024.
In all, OPEC pumped 26.49 million barrels per day during the month that just ended, down 100,000 barrels per day from March’s revised total, with the biggest output reductions coming from Nigeria and Iran.
As a result, supply curbs agreed by the group and its allies at the start of the year to avert a surplus were still unfinished. Iraq and the United Arab Emirates continued to pump several hundred thousand barrels a day above their agreed limits.
Nonetheless, output restraints by others in the alliance, such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Algeria helped buoy oil prices against a fragile economic backdrop, bolstering revenue for its members.
The biggest change last month was in Libya, which increased by 60,000 barrels a day to 1.19 million a day while it restored output halted earlier this year by protests at its largest oil field.
Several members of OPEC+, which include OPEC, Russia and other allies, made new cuts in January to counter economic weakness and increase supply outside the group. Producers agreed in March to keep the cuts in place until the end of June.
The 22-nation OPEC+ alliance, which spans other producers, such as Russia is due to meet on June 1 to decide whether to extend its current output curbs into the second half of the year.