The Federal Government recorded a shortfall of $11 billion (N3.3 trillion) in revenue from crude oil export in 2016.
This is according to the revenue fact sheet released on Monday by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), which revealed that Nigeria’s crude oil revenue fell from the $37 billion recorded in 2015 to $26 billion in 2016.
Nigeria has already earned $10 billion (N3.05 trillion) from oil export between January and April this year, according to the revenue fact sheet of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
The EIA stated: “However, Iran’s net export revenues are not adjusted for possible price discounts the country may have offered its customers between late 2011 and January 2016, when nuclear-related sanctions targeting Iran’s oil sales were in place. Saudi Arabia earned the largest share of these earnings, $133 billion in 2016, representing approximately one-third of total OPEC oil revenues.”
EIA projects that OPEC net oil export revenues will rise to about $539 billion dollars in 2017, based on projections of global oil prices and OPEC production levels in EIA’s May 2017.
On a per capita basis, OPEC net oil export earnings are expected to increase by about 18 per cent from $912 billion in 2016 to $1.112 trillion in 2017.
The expected increase in OPEC’s net export earnings is attributed to slightly higher forecast yearly crude oil prices in 2017 compared with 2016 as well as slightly higher OPEC output during the year.
For 2018, OPEC revenues are projected to be $595 billion, with an increase in forecast crude oil prices, coupled with higher OPEC production and exports, contributing to the rise in overall earnings.
