Data from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has revealed that the country made $2.27 million from gas sales in March 2016.

According to NNPC in its Monthly Financial and Operations Report for March, while $2.27 million was made from gas sales, $88.364 million was earned from crude oil export and $51.229 million from other receipts.

In total, revenues generated from crude oil and gas exports for the month amount to $141.87 million, compared to the $236.7 million recorded in February 2016.

Nigeria’s overall income from crude oil sales, between April 2015 and March 2016, was at $3.977 billion.

NNPC revealed that the severe drop in the country’s export is a s a result of the force majeure declared on the Forcados Terminal by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) on 15th February, 2016 shutting in about 300,000 barrels of oil per day.

This signifies that all un-exported cargoes for February and March were postponed till the renovation work on the terminal is completed.

On the other hand, data released by the National Bureau of Statistics, (NBS) shows that Nigeria spent N226.215 billion on the importation of petrol, in Q1 of 2016.

The importation of petrol represents 15.56% of Nigeria’s total imports in Q1.

Aside the importation of fuel, Nigeria also spent N12.016 billion on the importation of lubricating oils. Petrol and lubricant, as well as other petroleum products’ import, amount to N263 billion, representing 18.1% of total imports.

Nigeria’s highest import was from China, followed by the U.S., Belgium, India, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom accounting for N345.5 billion, N127.087 billion N114.16 billion, N89.38 billion, N73.777 billion and N61.38 billion respectively.

Others are France - N58.24 billion, Brazil - N50.06 billion, Germany - N44.9 billion and Italy - N31.06 billion, Sweet crudes reports.

Anita Fatunji