US raised imports of Nigerian oil to 76.9mb last year from 19.9mb in 2015—USEIA
Contrary to speculations that the United States drastically reduced imports of Nigerian oil since last two year, emerging figures from the US Energy Information Administration (USEIA) has revealed that it rather increased the purchase in 2016 from 19.9 million barrels (mb) in 2015 to 76.9mb.
Otherwise, the formally highest buyer of Nigerian oil for decades tripled the volume of crude oil bought from Nigeria last year, seven years after it began to depend less on the country’s crude due to the exploration of shale oil.
Only recently, figures from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) showed that India topped the chat of international buyers of Nigeria’s crude oil between February and November 2016 with 127.1 million barrels of crude within the period under review.
Other Nigeria’s crude oil favourite export destinations in that order include Spain who imported over 54 million barrels and Netherlands 40.7 million barrels within the period under review.
Besides, North America’s crude oil import from Nigeria increased from 5.9 million barrels in October to 13.1 million barrels in November 2016. The North America countries, which include Canada, Panama and United States Atlantic Coast, imported a total of 111 million daily between January and November 2016.
It was not however clear which statistics will be taken seriously as whereas USEIA said United State bought 76.9mb within the period under review, NNPC claimed that Spain who imported over 54 million barrels and Netherlands 40.7 million barrels within the period under review came second and third.
