As part of efforts by the Muhammadu Buhari administration to improve the capacity of the products and bring down prices of petroleum products, plans have been concluded to hold a national conference on integrating artisanal/modular petroleum refinery operations, the Federal Government has said.
Ita Enang, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Niger Delta Affairs, disclosed this at a news conference on Tuesday in Abuja.
The Presidency will hold the conference on March 16 and 17 in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning.
According to Enang the summit’s outcome would help to crash the country’s prices of petroleum products, adding that the conference aims to integrate local refining capacity into refining petroleum products such as petrol, kerosene, diesel, and other petrochemical products.
The presidential aide said that the conference will mobilise all Nigerian assets, including technologists, engineers, and other relevant disciplines, including those producing petroleum products at the creeks.
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He said:
As the cost of crude goes higher, the price of refined petroleum products goes higher, but if we refine these petroleum products in Nigeria, the cost will be very low.
The intendment of the conference is to mobilise these resources so that we can bring the prices of refined petroleum products down to below N100 per litre.
Enang further said the conference would help protect the environment, explaining that the conference will not legitimise illegal mining but integrate the operators into the legitimate refining process.
He also said the urgency of holding the conference was because the National Assembly had promised to pass the Petroleum Industry Bill by April.
He added:
Most of the issues that will be addressed at the conference are such issues that will require legislation, so any agreement that will be reached which requires legislation will be accommodated in the PIB.
