OPEC's benchmark oil price has risen back above 22 dollars, within the organization's target band, its secretariat said Wednesday but calls are growing within the group for a production cut to boost prices.
The OPEC price, based on an average of seven crudes worldwide, stood at 22.40 dollars on Tuesday, after remaining below 22 dollars for over a week during the Christmas holiday period, the body said in a statement.
The recent slump in prices has prompted increasing calls from OPEC member states to agree a production cut of up to two million barrels a day at a ministerial meeting scheduled in Vienna on January 17.
Kuwait's Oil Minister Saud Nasser al-Sabah became the latest OPEC member Wednesday to say that oil producers were likely to cut output, in his view by two million barrels per day (bpd) in an effort to strengthen prices.
Under an informal price-band mechanism agreed in March, the organization agreed to increase production by 500,000 dollars a day if its benchmark price stayed above 28 dollars for 20 working days, or cut output by the same amount if the price stayed below 22 dollars for more than 10 working days.
Crude prices soared to 10-year highs of over 35 dollars a barrel last year, sparking four production increases by the 11-member Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
But they slumped in December, passing below 22 dollars on December 21 for the first time in eight months.
The price-band mechanism was triggered in October, but OPEC ministers also decided at least once not to trigger the mechanism although the conditions for its implementation had been fulfilled -- VIENNA (AFP)
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