"Nigeria is a low income oil dependent country. It had an income per capita of US $2.162 in 2008 and an oil production of 2.09 million barrels per day, representing 37.1% of its GDP. In contrast, Colombia is a middle income country with a more modest production of oil and just mildly dependent on this resource. It had an income per capita of US $8.205 in 2008 and an oil production of 0.6 million barrels per day, representing just 4.9 % of GDP. The objective of this paper is to compare the macroeconomic and regional effects of oil abundance (or ependence) in these two countries and how they have managed it (both in terms of sectorial and macroeconomic policies and institutions), in order to derive policy recommendations for them, as well as for other oil abundant countries."