Nigeria has earned about 10.27 billion US dollars from over-the-expectation crude prices at the international oil market as at August, local press quoted Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as saying Tuesday.

The amount represents about 88.5 percent of the target of 11.6 billion dollars this year, and forms part of the foreign reserves put at 24 billion dollars.

Okonjo-Iweala also said the government had realized the revenue in the excess crude account domiciled at the central bank of about one billion dollars in August.

The Nigerian government had predicated the 2005 appropriation on an oil benchmark of 30 dollars per barrel, while the crude price at the international market currently hovers around 65 dollars per barrel.

Nigeria is Africa's top oil producer with a daily output of about 2.5 million barrels per day. The oil sector supplies 95 percent of its foreign exchange earning.

Source: Xinhua