Essam al-Marzouk, Kuwait Oil Minister |
Kuwaiti Oil Minister Essam al-Marzouk, whose country heads a
committee to monitor crude output cuts, on Monday, described as encouraging
production reductions announced so far.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting
Countries (OPEC) agreed in
November to cut its production by 1.2 million barrels per day starting January
to reduce a global supply glut that had kept prices painfully low. A group of
14 non-OPEC producers, led by the world’s top crude producer, Russia, agreed in
December to lower their output by another 600,000 bpd, making the total pledged
cuts at 1.8 million bpd.
“So far, all Gulf producers, Iraq and Russia have announced their commitment to the cuts,” Marzouk told a news conference after talks with OPEC secretary general, Mohammad Barkindo. “These commitments make up between 60 percent and 70 percent of the pledged cuts from the beginning of January,” said the minister. “We expect the compliance to the cuts to be big because of its impact on boosting prices.”
Kuwait heads
the five-member Joint Ministerial Monitoring Committee set up to monitor
compliance with the pledged cuts. Marzouk said he discussed with Barkindo
mechanisms to monitor the cuts by OPEC and non-OPEC members. The Kuwaiti minister
said they discussed monitoring output of each member country and also the level
of exports with the assistance of international companies.
Barkindo
described as historic the agreement between the 24 OPEC and non-OPEC producers.
Marzouk said the committee would meet in Vienna on January 21 and 22 to finalise
the monitoring mechanisms. (Guardian)
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