The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has recorded a trading deficit of ₦14.26billion for the month of January 2017; this represents about 16.19 per cent improvement when compared to ₦17.01billion it recorded in December, 2016, according to its Monthly Financial and Operations Report for January 2017.
The report indicated that the marginal decrease in the deficit is largely attributed to the improved Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) revenue and combined refineries inefficiency as well as reduction in the upstream costs by over 32 per cent relative to last month.
Other factors that affected the overall NNPC’s poor performance include production shutdown of Trans Niger Pipeline (TNP) and Nembe Creek Trunk Line (NCTL) due to pipeline leakages, shut down of Agbami Terminal for mini TAM and subsisting Force Majeure declared by SPDC as a result of the vandalized 48-inch Forcados export line after the restoration on 17th October, 2016 amongst others.
Meanwhile, the report also indicated that the Corporation recorded 233 per cent increase in pipeline vandalized points in one month. It said pipeline sabotage in the country increased from 18 downstream pipeline vandalized points in December, 2016 to 60 in January 2017. This represents 233 per cent increase relative to previous month despite the Federal Government and NNPC’s continuous engagements with the stakeholders.
It said NNPC undeniably needs the support of Nigerians especially in areas of security and Infrastructural integrity. It said favourable business environment will afford NPDC the opportunity to reverse deferred production revenue -average of N20 billion/month- caused by pipeline sabotage.
In the downstream sector, it said in spite of liberalization of petroleum products and government intervention to ease marketers access to foreign exchange (FOREX), NNPC remains the major importer of petroleum products, especially premium motor spirit (PMS) otherwise called petrol. The reluctance of other marketers to import petroleum products may not be unconnected with the high Dollar/Naira exchange rate against what was used during price liberalization as well as the upward swing in quotes for the product in the open market which would have taken the per litre price of PMS beyond the N145 per litre threshold.
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