Host communities hold the key to Nigeria’s oil targets for 2027 and 2030, according to Pipeline Infrastructure Nigeria Limited, the company responsible for the eastern corridor of the Trans Niger Pipeline.
The company made the case at its bimonthly meeting with host communities along the line in Port Harcourt. NNPC Ltd. is targeting crude production of 2 million barrels a day by 2027 and 3 million by 2030, along with 12 billion standard cubic feet of gas a day by 2030.
Why Nigeria’s oil targets depend on communities
Akpos Mezeh, the company’s general manager for community and government relations, said the industry is entering a period of renewed growth and linked rising output partly to the stability of pipeline networks. Meeting the targets, he said, will take closer cooperation between the company, communities and every stakeholder along the corridors.
He pointed to NNPC Ltd.’s audited 2025 results, which show crude and condensate output averaging 1.77 million barrels a day, the highest in five years, and gas production of 7.2 billion standard cubic feet a day, the highest in three years. NNPC reported profit after tax of N7.2 trillion, up 33% from N5.4 trillion in 2024.
Traditional rulers back the pipeline contract
Traditional rulers at the meeting tied national output directly to their areas. “There is no pipeline in Abuja,” said King Onyekachi Amaonwu of Omuma, adding that communities must work with the company. King Kevin Anugwo of Ekpeye Logbo said farmers and fishers have returned to their land and waters since crude theft along the line was curbed.
An official of the NNPC project monitoring office said the lines in PINL’s area are running well, and a youth leaders’ forum thanked the federal government for renewing the company’s contract.
What critics and regulators say
The claims come from a company that stands to benefit from its contract, and the picture elsewhere in the Niger Delta is more mixed. A case study by Fair Finance Nigeria, a coalition of civil society groups, described serious social and environmental problems in four communities in Akwa Ibom and Bayelsa states and said some pipeline installation companies and security forces colluded with thieves.
The Petroleum Industry Act requires upstream operators to pay 3% of their annual operating spending into host community development trusts. The regulator has incorporated 155 trusts, and reported that communities had received N98 billion and $150 million from the fund. Critics say 3% is too low, compared with the 5% once proposed.
Vice President Kashim Shettima said this week that more than 170 communities have benefited from projects chosen by the communities themselves, and he warned that companies receiving government incentives must meet their commitments to host communities.
Regulator data attributed 66% of oil spills in the Niger Delta in 2024 to sabotage, which is the exact problem pipeline surveillance contracts aim to solve.
Output is rising. Whether that lasts will depend on trust money reaching communities, spills being cleaned up and security contracts staying fair. Nigeria’s oil targets will be won or lost along those lines.
