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OPEC maintains oil production level despite price slump

Xinhua, November 28, 2014

• The ministers of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) decided on Thursday to maintain its output level despite crude oil price fell to a four-year low level, a statement released after the OPEC conference said.

  The decision to maintain oil production at the level of 30 million barrels a day agreed upon in December 2011 was made in the interests of restoring market equilibrium on the back of the recent rapid decline in oil prices, the statement said.

  The organization has "no target price," OPEC's Secretary-General Abudulla El-Badri told a press conference, referring to his previous aspirations of 100 dollars per barrel.

  El-Badri said the 12-member-nation cartel had decided to wait and see how the oil market would further develop, rather than cut production output in order to correct the price drop.

  "There is a price decline. That does not mean we should really rush and do something," he said.

  The decision means OPEC, who accounts for around 40 percent of global oil output, will stick to the production level it set in December 2011. Despite this level having been exceeded for some time, even if it is more strictly enforced it still has to contend with an overall extremely well-supplied global market, particularly with production and supply increases expected in non-OPEC countries such as the United States, on top of an already murky global economic outlook.

  "We don't want to panic," El-Badri said, adding that "We want to see how the market behaves because the decline of the price does not reflect a fundamental change."

  Crude oil prices fell to below 74 dollars per barrel after OPEC's decision on Thursday, the lowest level since September 2010.

  Supply and demand projections for 2015 were examined, and forecasts of increased global economic growth to 3.6 percent pointed toward an expected increase in world oil demand despite an extremely well-supplied global oil market, OPEC's statement said.

  An OPEC representative said the organization plans to meet again in June.

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