Home scarcity worsens as crude output falls to 1.3mbpd

Nigeria’s crude oil manufacturing dropped to 1.31 million barrels per day in February, whilst native refineries proceed to grapple with insufficient home crude provide wanted to maintain operations.

The event reveals that Nigeria once more failed to fulfill its crude oil manufacturing quota of 1.5 million barrels per day accredited by the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting International locations, as output declined sharply in February 2026.

Knowledge from OPEC’s newest Month-to-month Oil Market Report, based mostly on direct communication from member international locations, confirmed that Nigeria produced 1.314 million barrels per day in February, down from 1.459 mbpd recorded in January.

The figures point out a month-on-month decline of 146,000 barrels per day, widening the nation’s shortfall from its OPEC manufacturing allocation.

Nigeria’s incapability to fulfill its OPEC manufacturing quota just isn’t solely affecting its oil export earnings but additionally adversely impacting home refineries which might be starved of feedstock for his or her operations.

Recall that The PidomNigeria solely reported on March 9, 2026, that the Federal Authorities, by means of the Nigerian Nationwide Petroleum Firm Restricted, had begun strikes to safe crude oil provide for the Dangote Petroleum Refinery by means of third-party worldwide merchants, in a bid to maintain home refining operations.

“Leveraging our international crude buying and selling community, we’re sourcing third-party crude for the refinery at costs which might be aggressive with prevailing worldwide market charges,” a senior official at NNPC, who spoke in confidence because of the lack of authorisation to talk on the matter, had instructed The PidomNigeria.

The official additional defined, “Because the nationwide oil firm entrusted with safeguarding Nigeria’s vitality safety, NNPC Restricted stays totally dedicated to supporting home refining, together with the Dangote Petroleum Refinery. Throughout the framework of our current agreements, we proceed to facilitate crude provide to DRP, within the face of short-term availability constraints.”

The 650,000 bpd Dangote refinery had earlier highlighted constraints in home crude provide. It receives simply 5 cargoes a month from NNPC, as an alternative of the 13 cargoes required beneath the naira-for-crude coverage, forcing reliance on imported crude bought at worldwide market charges.

“Moreover, whereas we obtain about 5 cargoes a month from NNPC, which we pay for in naira, these cargoes are priced at worldwide market costs plus premium and fall wanting the 13 cargoes which we require to help gross sales into Nigeria,” the refinery had acknowledged.

The most recent OPEC report confirmed that though Nigeria recorded a marginal enchancment in January when manufacturing rose from 1.422 mbpd in December 2025 to 1.459 mbpd, the rebound was short-lived as output slipped considerably in February.

With the most recent figures, Nigeria has continued its streak of failing to fulfill the 1.5 mbpd OPEC quota, a pattern that has endured since August 2025. This implies Nigeria has failed to fulfill the OPEC report seven consecutive instances regardless of efforts to ramp up manufacturing.

Earlier information from the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Fee had additionally proven that crude oil manufacturing weakened on the finish of 2025 regardless of authorities efforts to spice up output. Manufacturing declined from 1.436 mbpd in November 2025 to 1.422 mbpd in December, earlier than recovering barely in January.

In 2025, Nigeria’s crude oil manufacturing fell under its OPEC quota in 9 months of the 12 months, assembly or barely exceeding the goal solely in January, June, and July. Nigeria opened 2025 strongly, producing 1.54mbpd in January, about 38,700 barrels per day above its OPEC allocation.

Nonetheless, manufacturing slipped under the quota in February at 1.47mbpd and weakened additional in March to 1.40mbpd, marking one of many widest shortfalls throughout the 12 months.

Though output recovered modestly in April (1.49mbpd) and Might (1.45mbpd), Nigeria remained under its OPEC ceiling till June, when manufacturing edged as much as 1.51mbpd, barely exceeding the quota. The nation sustained the momentum in July with 1.51 mbpd earlier than falling under the benchmark once more in subsequent months.

As 2026 progresses, there are expectations that Nigeria will ramp up crude manufacturing, particularly following the ramp-up of operations on the Dangote Refinery, which not too long ago introduced it had reached its full processing capability of 650,000 barrels per day.

January and February figures did not match the expectations of the Federal Authorities within the 2026 funds.

In the meantime, the brand new Chief Government of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Fee, Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan, as soon as pledged to extend oil manufacturing.

In a press release issued by the fee’s Head of Media and Strategic Communication, Eniola Akinkuotu, Eyesan mentioned her imaginative and prescient for the upstream sector rests on three pillars: manufacturing optimisation and income enlargement; regulatory predictability and velocity; and protected, ruled and sustainable operations.

In line with her, the agenda aligns with the Renewed Hope Agenda of Bola Tinubu and the administration’s plan to boost Nigeria’s crude oil manufacturing to 2 mbpd by 2027 and three mbpd by 2030.

Eyesan added that the fee would pursue manufacturing progress by recovering shut-in volumes with financial worth, arresting pure subject decline, lowering losses, and accelerating time-to-first oil, with out imposing extra regulatory burdens or transaction prices on operators.