Nigeria bullish about oil recovery

Efforts to restructure and boost investment appear to be working, but doubts remain about the plan to almost double crude production by 2030

Nigeria’s upstream is finally showing momentum after years of decline and regulatory uncertainty. Last year, three of four FIDs made by major oil firms in Africa were announced in the continent’s largest oil producer as President Bola Tinubu’s reform agenda started to bear fruit. Domestic oil output has slumped by 40% since a peak of roughly 2.5m b/d in 2005. Fast forward 20 years, and the government has set the ambitious target of reviving liquids production to 3m b/d and gas to 12bcf/d by the end of the decade. “The targets are undoubtedly ambitious,” said David Thomson, vice-president of sub-Saharan Africa at consultancy Welligence Energy Analytics. “The resource is there but attracting s