OPEC to Maintain Oil Output to Cool Down Prices

OPEC to maintain oil output to cool down prices

VIENNA, March 8 (Xinhua) — The consensus among OPEC’s energy ministers was to keep the official production quota at their meeting later to cool down the oil prices, Qatar’s Energy Minister Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah said on Wednesday.

Asked if he thought the consensus was to keep the production quota at 28million barrels of oil per day, he said :”I think so, yes.”

He added that he believed the consensus was “to roll over until (OPEC’s) next meeting in June.”

Most energy ministers of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries agreed to keep the oil output of 28 million bpd, to ensure ample supplies in the face of political instability and terrorist attacks targeting pipelines and other facilities in oil production countries.

They admitted that the current price of almost 62 U.S. dollars per barrel was uncomfortably high, and attacks against oil facilities in Nigeria and the Middle East helped push the prices up.

“We at OPEC are trying to keep the oil price below 60 U.S. dollars a barrel,” said Kuwait’s Energy Minister Sheikh Ahmad Fahd al-Sabah.