Economy
Nigeria Cuts Gas Flaring to 8%, Target 0% by 2025
By Adedapo Adesanya
The federal government has pledged to end gas flaring by 2025 following the significant reduction to eight per cent.
The pledge was made by the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr Timipre Sylva, on Monday at a public hearing on gas flaring organised by the House of Representatives in Abuja.
The Minister said that the public hearing was an opportunity to update the records and to bring stakeholders up to speed on happenings in the sector.
He said that elimination of gas flaring was an issue the ministry was taking seriously, saying it was committed to achieving the global consensus on elimination of gas flaring by 2025.
“Today, we have actually reduced gas flaring significantly to a very minimal level of eight per cent.
“If you all recall, in 2020, the ministry of petroleum started what we call the National Gas Expansion Programme and we declared the year 2020 as the year of gas.
“At the beginning of this year, we also declared the year 2021 the beginning of the gas decade. We believe that with all the programmes we have in place, we are on course to achieving complete elimination of gas flaring by the year 2025,” he said.
The Minister recalled that in December 2020, the ministry rolled out a gas penetration programme, noting that it was aggressively pursuing it to attain total elimination and utilisation of gas that was being flared today.
Also speaking, the Minister of Environment, Mr Muhammed Abubakar, said that gas flaring was one environmental challenge a lot had been said about.
Represented by the Director of Environment, Mr Abah Suleman, Mr Abubakar said that gas flaring leads to global warming.
“The fear that the earth might snowball into a runaway greenhouse effect as we have on planet Venus is one of the major reasons why it has been globally accepted that all hands must be on deck to ensure that gas flares are totally put out.
“The federal government has made commitments to the Paris Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change through our intended national determined contribution.
“The Ministry of Environment is highly desirous and has been giving support to the Ministry of Petroleum in this regard.
“As far back as 2003, when the ministry along some oil companies pushed for the use of compressed natural gas, which went comatose.
“I am happy to say that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has kick-started the programme,” he said.
Mr Abubakar said that the ministry had embarked on a programme that would accurately track gas flaring across the country.
He pledged the ministry’s support to enforce all laws and policies to ensure that Nigeria meets its global commitments on gas.
On his part, the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr Mele Kyari, said that gas has an attractive value, adding that no one would want to flare gas when it could be commercialised but there must be a perfect framework to achieve that.
“We are connecting most part of the country to the gas network so that people can convert this gas either for power or industrial use and we hope to achieve this by the end of March.
“It is business that makes people invest, no matter how much penalty you put, if the cost of the penalty is cheaper than the cost of developing the gas that may not be commercial, people will continue to flare gas and pay the penalty.
“You can raise the penalty to any number and what it does, it completely makes people not to invest in anything, so increasing the penalty is not the solution.
“The solution is to clear the commercial towns that will enable companies to invest in this flare so that we can convert them into money,” he said.
He said that the harm gas flaring was doing to communities and the environment would go away if commercialised, pledging to work with the National Assembly to put in place every structure required to end gas flaring in the country.
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria’s economy, measured by gross domestic product (GDP), grew by 4.07 per cent (year-on-year) in real terms in the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2025.
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) announced the development in its latest GDP report for Q4 2025 on Friday.
The latest figure represents an improvement over the 3.76 per cent growth recorded in the corresponding period of 2024, signalling sustained recovery across key sectors of the economy. The growth rate was faster than the third quarter’s 3.98 per cent.
The report confirmed that Nigeria’s oil sector grew 6.79 per cent year-on-year and the non-oil part of the economy expanded by 3.99 per cent.
Nigeria’s average daily oil production stood at 1.58 million barrels per day in the final three months of 2025. That was lower than the third quarter’s output of 1.64 million barrels per day but higher than the 1.54 million barrels per day in the fourth quarter of 2024.
Breakdown of the data showed that the agriculture sector grew by 4.00 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2025. This marks a significant increase compared to the 2.54 per cent growth recorded in the same quarter of 2024, reflecting improved output and resilience in the sector.
The industry sector also recorded a stronger performance during the period under review. It grew by 3.88 per cent year-on-year, up from 2.49 per cent posted in the fourth quarter of 2024. The improvement suggests enhanced activity in manufacturing, construction, and related industrial sub-sectors.
The services sector maintained its position as a major growth driver, expanding by 4.15 per cent in Q4 2025. However, this was slightly lower than the 4.75 per cent growth recorded in the corresponding quarter of the previous year.
Overall, the 4.07 per cent GDP growth in the final quarter of 2025 underscores broad-based expansion across agriculture, industry, and services, despite a marginal moderation in services growth.
The Q4 performance provides further evidence of strengthening economic momentum, with improvements recorded in both agriculture and industry compared to the previous year.
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
For the second time, Flour Mills of Nigeria Plc is sponsoring the Paris International Agricultural Show (PIAS) as part of its strategies to fortify its ties with France.
The 2026 PIAS kicked off on February 21 and will end on March 1, with about 607,503 visitors, nearly 4,000 animals, and over 1,000 exhibitors in attendance last year, and this year’s programme has already shown signs of being bigger and better.
The theme for this year’s event is Generations Solution. It is to foster knowledge transfer from younger generations and structure processes through which knowledge can be harnessed to drive technological advancement within the global agricultural sector.
In his address on the inaugural day of the Nigerian Pavilion on February 23, the Managing Director for FMN Agro and Director of Strategic Engagement/Stakeholder Relations, Mr Sadiq Usman, said, “At FMN, our mission is Feeding and Enriching Lives Every Day.
“This is a mandate we have fulfilled through decades of economic shifts, rooted in a culture of deep resilience and constant innovation. We support this pavilion because FMN recognises that the next frontier of global Agribusiness lies in high-level technical exchange.
“We thank the France-Nigeria Business Council (FNBC), the organisers of the PIAS, and our fellow members of the Nigerian Pavilion – Dangote, BUA, Zenith, Access, and our partners at Creativo El Matador and Soilless Farm Lab— we are exceedingly pleased to work to showcase the true face of Nigerian commerce.”
Speaking on the invaluable nature of the relationship between Nigeria and France, and the FMN’s commitment to process and product innovation, Mr John G. Coumantaros, stated, “The France – Nigeria relationship is a valuable partnership built on a shared value agenda that fosters remarkable Intercontinental trade growth.
“Also, as an organisation with over six decades of transformational footprint in Nigeria and progressively across the African Continent, FMN has been unwaveringly committed to product and process innovation.
“Therefore, our continuous partnership with France for the success of the Paris International Agricultural Show further buttresses the thriving relationship between both countries.”
PIAS is one of the most widely attended agricultural shows, with thousands of people from across the world in attendance.
By Adedapo Adesanya
Despite reservations from some quarters, the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) has praised President Bola Tinubu’s Executive Order 9, which mandates direct remittances of all government revenues from tax oil, profit oil, profit gas, and royalty oil under Production Sharing Contracts, profit sharing, and risk service contracts straight to the Federation Account.
Issued on February 13, 2026, the order aims to safeguard oil and gas revenues, curb wasteful spending, and eliminate leakages by requiring operators to pay all entitlements directly into the federation account.
NEITI executive secretary, Musa Sarkin Adar, called it “a bold step in ongoing fiscal reforms to improve financial transparency, strengthen accountability, and mobilise resources for citizens’ development,” noting that the directive aligns with Section 162 of Nigeria’s Constitution.
He noted that for 20 years, NEITI has pushed for all government revenues to flow into the Federation Account transparently, calling the move a win.
For instance, in its 2017 report titled Unremitted Funds, Economic Recovery and Oil Sector Reform, NEITI revealed that over $20 billion in due remittances had not reached the government, fueling fiscal woes and prompting high-level reforms.
Mr Adar described the order as a key milestone in Nigeria’s EITI implementation and urged amendments to align it with these reforms.
He affirmed NEITI’s role in the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) and pledged close collaboration with stakeholders, anti-corruption bodies, and partners to sustain transparent management of Nigeria’s mineral resources.
Meanwhile, others like the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) have kicked against the order, saying it poses a serious threat to the stability of the oil and gas industry, calling it a “direct attack” on the PIA.
Speaking at the union’s National Executive Council (NEC) meeting in Abuja on Tuesday, PENGASSAN President, Mr Festus Osifo, said provisions of the order, particularly the directive to remit 30 per cent of profit oil from Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs) directly to the Federation Account, could destabilise operations at the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited.
Mr Osifo firmly dispelled rumours of imminent protests by the union, despite widespread claims that the controversial executive order threatens the livelihoods of 10,000 senior staff workers at NNPC.
He noted, however, that the union had begun engagements with government officials, including the Presidential Implementation Committee, and expressed optimism that common ground would be reached.
Mr Osifo, who also serves as President of the Trade Union Congress (TUC), expressed concerns that diverting the 30 per cent profit oil allocation to the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC), without clearly defining how the statutory management fee would be refunded to NNPC, could affect the salaries of hundreds of PENGASSAN members.
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