Oil production hits three-year high as GDP grows by 2.28%

Data made available by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) shows that the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 2.28% in the third quarter of 2019.

This is 0.17 percentage points higher than the 2.12% revised GDP growth recorded in the second quarter.

The previous Q2 GDP figure released by the NBS was 1.94%.

According to the GDP report released by the bureau on Friday, the average daily oil production in the quarter was 2.04 million barrels per day (mbpd), its highest in more than three years.

Despite an increase in crude oil production, the real GDP growth of the oil sector was 6.49% year-on-year. This is 0.68 percentage points lower than the 7.17% recorded in the second quarter

“The non-oil sector grew by 1.85% in real terms during the reference quarter,” the report read.

“This is –0.48% points lower when compared to the rate recorded in the same quarter of 2018 but 0.20% points higher than the second quarter of 2019.

“During the quarter, the sector was driven mainly by the information and communication sector. Other drivers were agriculture, mining and quarrying, transportation and storage, and manufacturing.

“In real terms, the non-oil sector contributed 90.23% to the nation’s GDP, slightly lower than the share recorded in the third quarter of 2018 (90.62%), and in the second quarter of 2019 (91.02%).

In the third quarter, the oil sector contributed 9.77% to the GDP while the non-oil sector contributed 90.23%.

A breakdown showed that the agricultural sector contributed 29.25% to the GDP, industries contributed 22.17% and services contributed 48.59%.