Gas Consumption Lowest In Nigeria Despite Boosted Reserves

Nigeria’s Ministers of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylvia said, Nigeria’s per capita consumption of gas is the lowest in the sub-Saharan African region; Despite boasting of a 206 trillion standard cubic feet of gas reserves and topping major countries, ,

The Minister stated this at the 2021 yearly sub-Saharan African Oil and Gas Conference tagged ”The future of Upstream and Deepwater Development, Advancing Digitisation and Gas Development Options in Sub-Saharan Africa” and organised by Energy & Corporate Africa.

With the rapidly growing population of Nigeria, expected to outnumber that of the USA in about 20 years, Sylvia feared that the upsurge in the continent’s population could be challenging if not treated as an opportunity.

According to UN predictions, the present global population of 7.6 billion people will grow to 8.6 billion in 2030, 9.7 billion in 2050, and 10.6 billion in 2060. And in the year 2100, there will be 11.2 billion people on earth.

“A small number of countries will be responsible for the majority of the global growth. Half of the world’s population increase is anticipated to occur in just five nations in Africa between 2017 and 2050. They are Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, the United Republic of Tanzania, and Uganda,” he said.

The apex regulator, Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), acknowledged some of the gaps that are consistently explored by some operators, though it assured that regulatory efforts were on to block loopholes and check illegalities.