Saudi Arabia’s crude oil production rose to 9.759 million bpd, and the Kingdom was quite naturally the producer with the largest monthly increase. But Nigeria, Gabon, and Equatorial Guinea saw their output decline last month. The steepest drop was in Nigeria, whose production fell by 45,000 bpd to 1.354 million bpd, per OPEC’s secondary sources. Nigeria’s output was more than 200,000 bpd below its cap of 1.6 million bpd. Nigeria has been struggling to reach its quota while frequent force majeure events have also contributed to the much lower production than allowed under the OPEC+ deal.
At the end of October, Shell’s Nigerian unit declared force majeure on loadings of Bonny Light crude, following the shutdown of the Nembe Creek Trunk Line (NCTL) by the operator, Aiteo Exploration and Production Limited.
Elsewhere among African members, the combined crude production in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea fell by 30,000 bpd in October from September.
The OPEC members that raised their respective production last month included all three producers exempted from the OPEC+ cuts—Venezuela, Iran, and Libya. Venezuela boosted its oil production by 57,000 bpd per secondary sources in the OPEC report. Iran and Libya saw smaller increases of 10,000 bpd and 15,000 bpd. Since production at those three is not part of the OPEC+ deal, the 217,000-bpd output increase of OPEC-13 becomes even smaller when restricted to the 10 members part of the OPEC+ pact.
