Oil market closest to rebalancing: Dr Al Sada

DOHA: HE Dr. Mohammad bin Saleh Al Sada, Minister of Energy and Industry, has stated that the World oil market was currently closest to rebalancing. The continuous downward pressure on the prices in the last two years had dried-up the liquidity for investment in projects that would secure the required oil supplies.
Addressing a press conference at the GCC headquarters in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia yesterday, Dr. Al Sada said there is a pressing need for attracting huge investments in such projects.
The Minster, who is also the current president of Opec added that Opec member states had agreed to downsize their total production of oil to range between 32.5 and 33 mbpd and that a high-level technical committee had been tasked with establishing quotas for individual countries, to be finalised during the Opec meeting scheduled in November 30, 2016 in Vienna.
Dr Al Sada is heading the Qatar’s delegation to the 35th Meeting of the Oil Cooperation Committee. The meeting was held earlier yesterday at the GCC headquarters and chaired by Khalid A. Al Falih, Minister of Energy, Industry and Mineral Wealth in the Kingdom.
Russia’s energy minister met with counterparts from Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf oil-producers to discuss steps to stabilise crude markets amid Opec’ss drive to win cooperation from the biggest supplier outside the group in limiting output to prop up prices, agencies reported.
Ministers from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates gathered in Riyadh for oil talks at the offices of the Gulf Cooperation Council secretariat. Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak met with them later for a separate round of talks and was expected to speak afterward at a news conference. Oman was the only one of the GCC’s six members not attending.
“Oil markets are on the way to being re-balanced,” Saudi Arabia’s Energy and Industry Minister Khalid Al Falih said at the start of the GCC meeting. “Low oil prices are putting pressure on GCC countries’ development plans.” Russia was invited to attend the Gulf ministers’ talks, he said. “We are working with Russia and other oil producers to stabilize the market.”
Novak is set to meet representatives of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries on Monday in Vienna for talks that could include production cuts, and officials from Russia and Saudi Arabia will hold bilateral discussions later this month.
While Russian President Vladimir Putin has pledged to cooperate with OPEC, he’s been vague about whether the country will trim output or just freeze production at September’s post-Soviet record.
Opec is seeking to attract other producers to join the plan it agreed to last month at a meeting in Algeria to put into effect the group’s first output cuts in eight years.