The Federal Government has been enjoined to urgently resolve legacy debts, payment guarantees, and other commercial impediments, including power delivery bottlenecks in the Gas-to-Power programme.
This call was contained in a communique issued by the Nigeria Gas Association after the second edition of its industry multiloques.
The association said Nigeria must enhance the fiscal and operational policies required to attract the right investments to realise the objectives and aspirations outlined within the nation’s Gas programmes
It stated that Nigeria has enough gas resources to meet its demands in the domestic and export market and said all stakeholders must work with the Government to deliver Nigeria gas ambitions over the next decade.
Panelists at the conference also called for the adjustment of royalties on Gas supplied and consumed in the domestic environment to encourage more supplies that catalyse more significant development in the overall domestic economy.
They demanded non-discriminatory pricing mechanisms that offer suppliers equal opportunity for returns on investments and cost-reflective tariff structure across the Gas value chain.
There was consensus that the gas supply industry must be anchored on a willing-seller willing-buyer framework to unlock further investments in gas exploration and delivery infrastructure.
The group also advocated for the removal of price controls and concessional Gas tariffs for sections of the market that are critical to achieving overall economic growth objectives the communique stated
The scope of the National Gas Transportation Network Code’s the association demanded should be expanded to fully cover the domestic Gas market in line with provisions already specified by the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), which regulates the industry.
It called on the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and other development banks to prioritise the gas industry, underpinned by concessional interest rates and guarantees for dollar-denominated transactions, to assure lender confidence in gas projects.
The communique stated that PENCOM should make the $32 billion pension funds available to Natural Gas investors as priority funding for critical Gas infrastructure, to bolster economic diversification and sustained industrialisation in the country.
It is also agreed at the conference by the panelists that cost-reflective pricing mechanism, favourable fiscal regime, ease of repatriation of dividend/capital, stable exchange rate, and national industrial policy stability are critical conditions for spurring equity and loan financing in the local Gas market.
“There is a need to warehouse world-class local capacity to adapt imported technologies for the local conditions to reduce overdependence on Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), improve local content know-how, deepen innovations, curtail maintenance costs and the overall cost of production,” it stated.
The conference highlighted the need to create and develop regional infrastructure across the West African economies to deliver gas supplies to markets through various marine, rail, road, and pipeline channels.
They also called for improved regional collaboration on maritime security to arrest the Gulf of Guinea’s rising piracy incidents for safer virtual Gas shipping through marine transport.
The process of building industry capacity and retooling professionals from an oil based economy to a gas based economy should begin in earnest with the NGA playing a central role
