Petrol imports are falling. Cooking gas is telling a different story
Nigeria is refining more petrol at home, yet cooking gas imports have surged. The contrast reveals the biggest challenge facing the country's gas economy.
Nigeria’s energy story appears to be moving in two different directions. On one side, the country’s dependence on imported petrol is gradually easing as domestic refining expands and local supply takes on a bigger role. On the other side, cooking gas imports have exploded, exposing a widening gap between Nigeria’s enormous natural gas wealth and the fuel reaching millions of homes.
Latest data from the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) shows Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), commonly known as cooking gas, imports surged by 1,400 percent in June after domestic supply weakened. During the same period, domestic petrol supply declined by 22 percent, highlighting how differently the two markets are evolving.
The numbers raise an uncomfortable question. How can one of the world’s largest gas producers still rely heavily on imported cooking gas?
Nigeria has gas. Lots of it.
Nigeria possesses about 209 trillion cubic feet of proven natural gas reserves, among the largest in Africa. For years, successive governments have promoted gas as the country’s transition fuel through initiatives such as the Decade of Gas, hoping to expand domestic cooking gas use, generate electricity, power industries and reduce dependence on dirtier fuels such as firewood and kerosene. Yet abundance underground has not translated into sufficient supply above ground.
According to the NMDPRA data, domestic LPG supply slipped from 4.0 kilotonnes per day in May to 3.6 kilotonnes in June, while imports jumped from 0.1 kilotonnes to 1.5 kilotonnes per day. Imports accounted for almost 30 percent of total LPG supply during the month, meaning nearly one in every three tonnes of cooking gas consumed in Nigeria came from overseas.
Why petrol and cooking gas are moving in opposite directions
The contrast is striking because Nigeria’s petrol market is beginning to benefit from increased domestic refining capacity.
Although petrol imports remain part of the supply mix and even rose in June as domestic receipts dipped, local refineries have fundamentally changed the market compared with previous years, when Nigeria depended almost entirely on imported fuel.
Cooking gas has not experienced the same transformation.
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Unlike petrol, LPG depends on a supply chain that includes gas processing plants, storage facilities, coastal terminals, bottling infrastructure and reliable distribution networks. Any disruption in domestic production can quickly create shortages that marketers bridge through imports. June’s figures suggest exactly that happened.
The largest share of local LPG still came from deliveries by Nigeria LNG (NLNG) and other gas producers, while local refineries supplied only a small fraction of domestic demand. When those supplies weakened, imports filled the gap almost immediately.
A business opportunity hiding in plain sight
The surge in imports is not only an energy story. It is also a business story. Every additional tonne of imported LPG represents revenue flowing to foreign suppliers instead of Nigerian processors, storage operators and distributors.
At the same time, demand for cooking gas continues to grow as more households and businesses switch away from kerosene and firewood. That expanding market is creating opportunities across the value chain, from cylinder manufacturing and bottling plants to logistics, retail distribution and home delivery services. The challenge is ensuring domestic production grows quickly enough to meet that demand.
The bigger question for Nigeria’s gas economy
The latest import figures also expose a contradiction at the centre of Nigeria’s energy strategy.
Between January 2025 and June 2026, Nigeria exported more marketed gas than it supplied to its domestic market, even as local industries, manufacturers and households continued to face supply constraints. Over the same period, the country flared gas worth an estimated US$888 million, despite repeated commitments to increase domestic utilisation.
That gap between production and local availability remains one of the biggest obstacles to building a truly gas-powered economy.
For Nigeria, the success of the petrol market cannot become the benchmark for the wider energy sector. Reducing petrol imports is an important milestone, but the country’s broader ambition is to use its abundant gas resources to power homes, industries and economic growth.
