There are strong indications that the United States will resume buying Nigeria’s crude oil following ongoing talks in this regard between the US and the Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government.
Minister of state for petroleum, Dr Ibe Kachikwu, who gave the indication, said despite having diversified into the Asian market and other parts of the world, government is presently in talks with the United States government on the possibility of them resuming the purchase of our crude oil.
His words: “Post the president’s visit, there have been overtures from them (US) to say they want to go back to buying very limited quantity of Nigerian oil, partly to support the market, and conversations are still ongoing with that.”
He disclosed this while speaking to journalists at the Kaduna airport after undertaking an inspection tour of the Kaduna Refinery and Petrochemical Company (KRPC) on Sunday.
Speaking in response to a question on the fate of the Nigerian/US crude trade following US’ oil sufficiency, Kachikwu noted that the development is part of the outcome of President Buhari’s visit.
Meanwhile, Kachikwu has stated that the country is targeting the production of daily crude production of 2.5 million barrels by 2016.
On the issues of refinery, he said: “If you want to build a new refinery, it takes an average of two to five years and investment of between $2bn and $2.5bn.
What we are encouraging people to do is to be able to unbundle certain refineries that are all over the world, which the owners have decided not to continue with for economic reasons, come over here, set them up and run them.
“If you are going to do that, it will run down your cost; if you are sharing the same premises, same tank farm, same pipeline and power source, it automatically reduces your cost to around $1bn…”
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