OPEC, a cash cow!

VIENNA - The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is ...always ready... to provide all the oil that the world economy may need, said Tuesday the cartel's secretary general, Abdullah El Badri at a press conference in Vienna.

•      “OPEC is always ready to provide at any time the oil that the world may need, whatever the amount requested,” stressed the Secretary General during the closing press conference of the sixth meeting of the dialogue between OPEC and the European Union.
  
      “We are in a situation of excess production capacity,” he recalled, adding that there was “no problem of security of supply.” Moreover, he stressed the "problems of last year were due to speculation, not supply problems.”
  
      He said that the cartel currently meet 75% of their production quotas set for their meeting in December in Oran, Algeria.
  
      Since then the reductions, the cartel did not change its quotas by calling at each of its meetings since then to apply those best quotas.
  
       While the world economy seems to recover with a price of a barrel around $ 70, Mr. El Badri said that “even at $ 80 it would not threaten the global recovery,” noting that the concerns appear only when the price of a barrel of crude oil exceeds $ 100.
  
      In July 2007, the price of oil had peaked at over 147 dollars.
  
      The European Commissioner for Energy Andris Piebalgs, in his turn, also found that a barrel at 70 dollars “did not really stop the economic recovery in the world” adding that it was “a correct price to continue to invest in oil production.”
  
      “But,” he warned, “We should remain vigilant and see if additional steps are necessary to stabilize the situation facing any challenges.”
  
       The EU and OPEC agreed to conduct a study on bio-fuels, in particular, their impacts on the refining industry. The two sides will also hold a roundtable on the impact of the global financial crisis on the oil sector.
      
  Ennaharonline/ M. O.