O.T. NPDC generates N177b revenue from crude oil sale
THE Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC), may have experienced mixed fortunes in its last operating year, going by its yearly statement of account.
Indeed, while the company's turnover rose to N177.5 billion for the year ended December, 2006, its profit after tax fell short of the preceding year by 65 per cent as it recorded N19.7 billion.
Presenting the company's yearly report and statement of account, its chairman Dr. Funso Adebiyi, said that the revenue figure represented 11 per cent rise above the N162 billion recorded in 2005.
"The amount was realised from the 21.2 million barrels of crude oil lifted from the Mystras terminal in 2006," Adebiyi said.
"The NPDC recorded N56.71 billion last year due to the shut-in of its on-shore crude operations," Adebiyi said.
He attributed the increase in revenue to sustained production from Okono/Okpoho as well as the "unprecedented and favourable global oil prices which were above the plan price of $55 per barrel."
He said that the sustained increase in global demand for crude oil in 2006 impacted positively on NPDC's operations.
Adebiyi added that the company was able to attract high prices than planned for its crude oil streams with no distressed cargo recorded.
He said that the downside in "our operating environment was the continued shut-in of land operations in Abura, Oredo and Oziengbe fields and the attack on Mystras by militants in November."
Adebiyi said that the attacks affected operations to the extent that the production of about 2.2 million barrels of oil was deferred. He added that the three fields produced 334,483 barrels, which amounted to an average daily production of 1,014 barrels in January and February.
This, he explained, represented 11.3 per cent of planned production of 2.94 million barrels per day and said that the fields were shut due to Forcados export pipeline vandalism.
He concluded that the company could not also obtain a rig to execute its drilling campaign and that NPDC also carried out gas studies during the year to establish a strategy to develop and monetise its gas resources.
"This was with a view to ensuring compliance with government directive to flare out by 2008," he said.
The company's Managing Director, Mr. Fisoye Delano, said that during the review period, NPDC began to reap in earnest, the benefits of its various transformation initiatives under the aegis of the "NNPC's Project PACE."
He added that in 2006, NPDC assumed effective take-over of some assets from NNPC Joint Venture Partners and continued the expansion of its portfolio. The company, he said, got into the international terrain through participation in the bid round for a block in Equatorial Guinea and the acquisition of two blocks.
"This would provide a unique entry into what is genuinely acceptable today as a fast growing Gulf of Guinea Petroleum Play,'' Delano concluded.
