Shell to raise Nigerian oil production

A year after being forced to shut down more than half of its oil output in Nigeria because of militant violence, Royal Dutch Shell said it expected to resume full production within the next “five to six months,” after agreeing with local communities that it could safely return to the Niger Delta.

“We see this year as a year when we start clawing back our production,” Basil Omiyi, the Shell managing director for Nigeria, said during an interview Tuesday in Abuja, the Nigerian capital. “I don’t see anything standing in our way of restarting our production.”
Omiyi, in his first extensive public comments in over a year, said that in return for being allowed back in the Western Delta, Shell planned to “significantly” increase the amount of work it awards to local communities by shifting more service contracts to local villages and businesses. That include things such as food catering, barge or boat leasing, maintenance, or water transportation.

His comments were an indication that the company may have found an accommodation with some of the groups that have been behind the violence. Omiyi said he had not received any security guarantees from militant groups like MEND, nor had he negotiated with them. Yet he felt confident enough to allow his workers back in the fields.

International Herald Tribune