ENVIRONMENT AND THE CHALLENGES OF THE NIGERIAN NATIONAL PETROLEUM CORPORATION (NNPC) IN NIGERIA

Abstract

Petroleum production and export play a dominant role in Nigeria's economy and account for about 90% of her gross earnings. This dominant role has pushed agriculture, the traditional mainstay of the economy, from the early fifties and sixties, to the background. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) found in 1977 through the merger of some of the departments of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, and the old Nigerian National Oil Corporation, is charged with the responsibility for upstream and downstream developments, regulating and supervising the oil industry on behalf of the Nigerian Government. Since the discovery of oil in Nigeria in the 1950s, the country has been faced with the negative environmental consequences of oil development. The growth of the country's oil industry, combined with population explosion and lack of environmental regulations, has led to substantial damage to Nigeria's environment, especially in the Niger Delta region, the centre of the country's oil industry. Nigeria's main environmental challenges result from oil spills, natural gas flaring and deforestation. Industrialization is vital to a nation‘s socio-economic development as well as its political structure in the comity of nations. It provides ready employment opportunities for a good percentage of the population in medium to highly developed economies. Although, industrialization is inevitable, various devastating ecological and human disasters which have continuously occurred over the last three decades or so, implicate industries as major contributors to environmental degradation and pollution problems of various magnitudes. It is therefore recommended that, nongovernmental organizations, international oil companies and well spirited individuals will have to work together to slow the degradation of Nigeria's environment and take steps to mitigate the problems that a half-century's worth of oil production already has caused.