66% of Nigeria’s crude oil theft recorded in final quarter of 202
Nigeria lost 3.33 million barrels of crude oil to theft in 2025, with about 66 per cent of the losses recorded in the last three months of the year.
The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) disclosed this in its 2025 annual report released on Thursday.
The report showed that crude oil theft increased sharply in the fourth quarter, despite efforts to reduce losses in the country’s oil sector.
A breakdown of the figures showed that Nigeria lost 896,471 barrels of crude oil to theft in the first quarter of 2025.
However, the second quarter recorded a negative figure of 200,400 barrels, which the commission described as excess volume discovered during reconciliation.
The country recorded 440,434 barrels of crude oil theft in the third quarter, while the fourth quarter had the highest loss of 2.19 million barrels.
The report also showed that Nigeria produced 541.08 million barrels of crude oil and blended condensate in 2025.
Production increased from 132.70 million barrels in the first quarter to 137.69 million barrels in the second quarter. It later dropped slightly to 137.45 million barrels in the third quarter and 133.23 million barrels in the fourth quarter.
Nigeria also produced 48.52 million barrels of unblended condensate during the year.
NUPRC approves plans to increase oil production
The commission also disclosed that it processed 75 applications for field development plans in 2025.
The applications included 58 received during the year and 17 carried over from 2024.
Out of the 75 applications, 48 were approved, 10 were rejected, while 17 were still being processed at the end of the year.
According to the report, the approved projects are expected to develop about 1.75 billion barrels of oil reserves, 104.48 million barrels of condensate reserves and 8.19 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves.
The projects are also expected to increase Nigeria’s production capacity by 743,830 barrels of oil per day, 23,707 barrels of condensate per day and 3.09 billion standard cubic feet of gas per day.
The commission said the projects are expected to begin producing oil between 2026 and 2030.
Seven of the 48 approved projects are focused entirely on developing gas fields.
Nigeria’s oil production outlook
The latest figures come amid concerns about crude oil theft and Nigeria’s ability to meet its oil production targets.
In August 2026, businessman Tony Elumelu said Nigeria’s oil production losses had dropped from 97 per cent before President Bola Tinubu took office in 2023 to two per cent as of June 2026.
Elumelu had earlier raised concerns about oil theft in March 2022, when he said Nigeria was losing more than 95 per cent of production from some oil operations to theft.
For 2026, the Federal Government’s budget is based on an oil production target of 1.84 million barrels per day and a benchmark price of $64.85 per barrel.
However, data from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) showed that Nigeria’s crude oil production averaged 1.505 million barrels per day from July 2026.