An oil expert has warned the Arab countries against privatizing their oil sectors, calling such moves a “risk” and maintaining that such resources should remain in the public sector.
The expert predicted that the global dependence on Arab oil would continue in the foreseeable future, with demand rising to 113 million bpd (barrels per day) in the next 20 years.
Hussain Abdullah, a former Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum undersecretary for Arab energy and international affairs, was quoted by the Gulf news as saying that “the world will increasingly depend on Arab oil. Global oil demand will rise by 1.9 percent (annually) from around 75 to 113 million bpd by 2020."
He also predicted that industrial countries' oil imports from the Middle East would account for 75 percent of their needs by 2020.
But allowing multinationals equity shares in oil and gas production is risky: "It should be exclusively handled by the public sector in oil-exporting countries,” said the paper.
Abdullah said that “there is pressure from industrial countries to open the oil industry to multinational companies and use GATT agreements to benefit from privileges endowed to national oil firms."
He added that half of future oil demand would be traded internationally, and that only OPEC supply it.
"There are only six OPEC members whose oil reserves can be expanded to meet growing oil demand: Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, the UAE and Venezuela,” he said.
"Oil exports will be more focused and dominated by these six major countries, thus facilitating the coordination of policies. Oil supplies of non-OPEC countries will be gradually depleted," he added.
But he pointed out that the oil market would get tighter and prices would rise even without coordination of policies – Albawaba.com
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