The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), has commended Nigeria for ranking third among member countries in data submission.
Omar Ibrahim, OPEC Governor for Nigeria, disclosed this at the OPEC Data Management Training Workshop in Abuja, on Monday.
Ibrahim said Nigeria has done well in the provision of credible data in the oil and gas sector.
“For some time, our record at data submission and also the accuracy of data, hasn’t been good in OPEC and we have always lagged behind most OPEC countries in data submission as well as the accuracy of data that we have been submitting,” Ibrahim said, adding that this has changed in the last three years with the accuracy of the data submitted by Nigeria improving tremendously.“In the last three years, things have changed, OPEC is very happy with us; the accuracy of our data has improved tremendously as also, the timeliness of the submission of our data has improved tremendously, I believe that as at today we are the third in the hierarchy of data submission,” Ibrahim said.
On the training, he said the major focus would essentially be on every part of data from crude oil production, Nigeria’s GDP and oil consumption.
Folasade Yemi-Esan, permenent secretary, Ministry of Petroleum Resources said the ministry had been working with relevant agencies to ensure accuracy in data collection.
She named the agencies to include the Central Bank of Nigeria, National Bureau of Statistics, Debt Management Office, among others.
She expressed joy over the OPEC commendation of the credibility of the data presented by the Nigerian government to the organisation, noting that it underscored the purpose of the training workshop. “We want to be sure we are doing the right thing,” she said.
She regretted that some stakeholders were yet to appreciate government’s effort at ensuring credible and vast depository of data in the country as she urged OPEC to ensure that the training exposed participants to more valuable ways of gathering data in the country.
