Thank you for standing by. My name is Jale, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Murphy Oil Corporation annual meeting. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Ted Botner, Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary. You may begin.
Thank you, Jale. Good morning as well. During the meeting today, the company may make forward-looking statements as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. As such, no assurances can be given that these events will occur or that projections will be attained. A variety of factors exist that may cause actual results to differ. For further discussion of risk factors, see Murphy's 2023 annual report on file with the SEC. Murphy takes no duty to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. I will now turn the call over to our Chairman of the Board, Mr. Claiborne Deming.
Thanks, Ted. I will now call the 67th Annual Shareholders Meeting of Murphy Oil Corporation to order. As Roger will review, the company had a solid year of operations and free cash flow generation, and importantly, is on track to become one of the most financially strong and stable companies in our industry. Given inherent commodity price volatility, this is now more important than ever. Ironically, as our industry faces more challenges than ever, given the growing realization that the energy transition will take longer and be more expensive than initially understood, as well as increased geopolitical conflict, we remain, as an industry, more necessary and relevant as ever. Be assured that your company is prepared to meet this need from an energy-hungry world and also be equally assured that we understand our obligations to keep shareholders' interests first and foremost.
Now I would like to introduce our talented board of directors: Larry Dickerson, Michelle Earley, Roger Jenkins, Elisabeth Keller, Jim Kelly, Madison Murphy, Jeff Nolan, Bobby Ryan, and Laura Sugg. In addition, we are joined here today by Ashleigh Sherrill, lead engagement partner of KPMG LLP, our independent auditor. At this time, I would like to turn the meeting back to our Corporate Secretary, Ted Botner. Mr. Botner will be reporting on the company's business items of the meeting.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before we begin the business of the meeting, I would like to review a few housekeeping items. On our virtual meeting portal located on the left-hand side of the screen, you should see the meeting materials, including the agenda and rules of conduct. We will follow the agenda and ask that you please abide by the posted rules. Only validated stockholders may submit questions, and out of consideration for others, we ask that you please limit yourself to one question. Further, only questions or concerns specific to the proposals being voted on today may be submitted. If you have general questions, we are happy to answer those at a later time. Please see the contact information for our investor relations group. As noted in the rules of conduct, this meeting is being recorded, but participants are not authorized to use any recording device.
Further, we have available for inspection during the meeting a list of the stockholders of record as of the close of business on March 11, 2024. This list can be found in the lower right corner of the screen. Finally, our board has appointed Thiago Cooper to act as judge of election for the meeting. Mr. Cooper is present today and has taken an oath of office, which will be filed with the minutes of this meeting.
Mr. Botner, will you provide proof of notice of the meeting and that a quorum is present?
Yes, sir. The notice of the meeting and internet availability of proxy materials were mailed by Broadridge beginning on March 21, 2024, to all stockholders of record as of the close of business on March 11th. As such, the meeting is being held pursuant to proper notice. An affidavit from Broadridge as to the mailing of the notice to all record-date stockholders will be filed with the minutes. The affidavit is available for inspection by any stockholder. Proxies representing approximately 90% of the votes entitled to be cast by the holders of over 152 million outstanding shares are present. As such, the judge of election and Broadridge have confirmed that we have a quorum.
Thank you, Mr. Botner. A quorum is present, and the meeting is duly constituted. The minutes of the 2023 annual meeting of stockholders are also available for your inspection during the meeting under the meeting materials link on the web portal. I now declare the polls open. We have three formal matters to be voted on today. First, to elect as directors the 10 nominees named in the proxy statement. Second, to hold an advisory vote on the compensation of named executive officers as determined by the compensation committee of the board. And third, the ratification of the audit committee's appointment of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the year 2024. Under our bylaws, the deadline for submitting a nominee for director or any other stockholder proposal has passed, and no other nominations for director or stockholder proposals were submitted.
Therefore, these three items are the only matters we will consider at this meeting. We will now address any questions specifically related to the three proposals. If you have a question related to these proposals, please submit your question now.
Mr. Chairman, I have reviewed the portal, and there are no questions specific to the proposals being voted on today. You may continue with the vote.
Thank you, Mr. Botner. We will now proceed with the voting. Stockholders who may have already voted do not need to vote at this time unless they want to change their vote. If you have not already voted and would like to vote now, please do so by clicking on the voting button on the web portal and following the instructions there. While we await the results of voting, Roger will provide a brief company outlook.
Thank you, Claiborne, and good morning to all our valued shareholders. Murphy had another great year in 2023. We achieved our strategy to delever, execute, explore, and return, which enabled us to advance our company's goals and, most importantly, our capital allocation framework. I'm pleased that our team accomplished this past year. We reduced debt by $500 million, resulting in $1.3 billion of long-term debt remaining at year-end, the lowest since 2011. Even more importantly, since year-end 2020, we've reduced debt by more than 55%, or $1.7 billion, while increasing production, completing a major offshore project, and replacing our oil and gas reserves. We achieved full-year production of 186,000 barrels equivalent per day, with 98,000 barrels of oil per day. This annual production level is our highest in nearly a decade, and our strong asset performance represented 11% total production growth over 2022.
Additionally, we achieved 139% reserve replacement in 2023, continuing Murphy's long track record of replacing reserves. I look forward to showcasing our offshore execution ability again as our board sanctioned the Lac Da Vang field development in Vietnam. This multi-phase project is set to achieve first oil in late 2026, with final phase completed in 2029. We maintain an active exploration program, and last year we announced that we drilled discovery at the Longclaw exploration well in the Gulf, which will ultimately tie back to our King's Quay facility. This year, we plan to drill two exploration wells in the Gulf of Mexico and two exploration wells in Vietnam. We're also recently awarded six deepwater exploration blocks in the Gulf of Mexico federal lease sale. Additionally, we announced a new country entry in Côte d'Ivoire, Africa, with five exploration blocks with Murphy as the operator.
One of these blocks includes the previously appraised undeveloped Paon discovery. In the near term, we will focus on conducting full geophysical studies and reprocessing seismic data across these blocks. Simultaneously, we are reviewing commerciality and field development concepts as a step to submitting a viable development plan for the Paon field by the end of 2025. Importantly, an international oil company recently announced a discovery in a nearby exploration well, and we're excited that our Côte d'Ivoire acreage is now bookended by two significant discoveries by this operator. As we progressed our capital allocation framework in 2023 with $500 million debt reduction, we also increased our shareholder returns. In total for the year, we purchased $150 million of stock, or 3.4 million shares outstanding.
We also increased our dividend by 10% in early 2023 and a further increase in 2024 to $1.20 per share annualized, which is back to a level we had in 2016. Murphy remains an environmental steward, and I'm proud of our team's drive to make it better. In 2023, Murphy achieved the lowest greenhouse gas emissions intensity since becoming an independent exploration and production company in 2013, as well as the second highest water recycling ratio in the company's history. We published our fifth annual sustainability report in August of 2023, and we continually strive to enhance our disclosures on improving environmental performance. In closing, our management team would like to thank our board of directors for their support and to our dedicated employees. Thank you for your ongoing work to make it better at Murphy so we can achieve our goals and positively impact lives.
Thank you to our shareholders for your longstanding support of Murphy Oil Corporation as we execute our strategy to de-risk our balance sheet, operate efficiently and safely, minimize impacts on the environments, and enhance returns to shareholders. Now, as we go to the next part of the meeting, I will turn the call back to our Chairman, Claiborne Deming.
Thanks, Roger. Great report. The polls are now closed to voting. Mr. Botner, do you have election results?
Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to report that all nominees for director have been elected with a 90%-99% of the votes cast. The stockholders have approved, on an advisory basis, the compensation of the company's named executive officers with approximately 99% of the vote, and the appointment of KPMG LLP has been approved with approximately 97% of the vote. Our judge of election will prepare a final report that will be included as part of the record of this meeting. We will also report the final results on a Form 8-K to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission within four business days. Mr. Chairman, that concludes all agenda items, and you may adjourn the meeting at your pleasure.
Thank you, Mr. Botner, and we are adjourned.
This concludes today's meeting. You may now disconnect.