The Nigerian government introduced the marginal field development programme in 1996 to help grow the country’s oil and gas production by divesting the majors of dormant discoveries and making the same available to indigenous operators who are nimble enough to venture into neglected terrains.
The programme has seen Shell, Total, Agip, Chevron and others surrender fields that are then allocated to marginal field operators in bid rounds. A corollary to the programme is the development of local content in the oil and gas industry, and it is no coincidence that the Nigerian Content Act came into force in 2010, five years after the marginal field initiative was introduced.