BEVET HILLS, September 21, (THEWILL) – Nigeria has decided to reduce equity shares in all its oil and gas joint venture deals to 40%, Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva said Friday.
Government also plans to increase crude production to at least 3 million barrels per day and reduce the cost of production by at least 5%.
Sylva in a statement according to state owned oil corporation,
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), enumerated the plans of the government in a presentation at the commencement of a two-day ‘Next Level Strategic’ retreat he held with the heads of ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) under him.
The statement signed by the Group General Manager, Public Affairs of the NNPC, Mr. Ndu Ughamadu, said the Minister noted that the NNPC and other departments and agencies under the ministry must key into the policy of the Ministry.
He listed other priority areas to include curbing petroleum products cross border leakages, completion of gas flare commercialization.
The rest, he said are aggressive promotion of passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB); promotion of inland basin exploration activities; promotion of deep offshore exploration activities; collaboration with private sector to aggressively increase domestic refining capacity and working assiduously to support the president in his poise to achieving his target of raising millions of Nigerians out of poverty via job creation.
The minister told heads of the agencies that at end of the retreat they would be required to collectively sign an undertaking to deliver on the set tasks and targets, saying they must execute the mandate with all the seriousness it deserves.
Also speaking, Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari, expressed the readiness of corporation to align with the spirit and letter behind the key priorities areas, stressing that as the main enabler of the Nigerian economy, NNPC would work with other agencies of the ministry to make the outlined aspirations a dream come true.
He noted that the coming of Sylva promised to engender high-level Inter-agencies collaboration across all tiers of the sector.
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