Azerbaijan to cut oil production from 2019 as part of OPEC+ deal
By Leman Mammadova
Azerbaijan will reduce oil production from January 2019 by 20,000 barrels as part of the OPEC+ agreement, the Azerbaijani Energy Ministry told Trend Dec. 21.
“Azerbaijan will reduce oil production by 20,000 barrels from the production level in September 2018,” the ministry said.
In September 2018, daily oil production in Azerbaijan amounted to 796,000 barrels and Azerbaijan made a commitment to reduce this figure to 776,000 barrels per day starting from 2019, according to the ministry.
It should be noted that major oil producers have reached a deal to reduce oil production by 1.2 million barrels per day at the 5th meeting of OPEC and non-OPEC ministers held in Vienna on December 7.
It has been agreed to reduce daily oil production by 0.8 million barrels per day (2.5 percent) for OPEC countries in the first six months of 2019. Non-OPEC countries have agreed to reduce oil production by 0.4 million barrels per day (2 percent).
The agreement will enter into force on January 1, 2019. The next meeting of OPEC and non-OPEC format will be held in Vienna in April next year to revise the agreement.
According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the demand for crude oil produced by OPEC countries at the world market is currently at 31.3 million barrels.
Recently, Executive Director of International Energy Agency Fatih Birol stated that oil production in the US will change the balance of energy in the world, oil production in the United States will reach the level in Russia and Saudi Arabia by 2025 and therefore high increase in oil prices is not expected in the near future.
Azerbaijan also supported the decision to reduce oil production and joined the agreement to support the process of world oil market regulation.
In January-November 2018, Azerbaijan produced 35.47 million tons of oil and gas condensate, which is 0.1 percent more than in the same period of 2017, according to the Azerbaijani State Statistics Committee.
According to the data Azerbaijan presented to the OPEC Joint Technical Committee as part of the Vienna Agreement, daily oil production stood at 801,000 barrels in November 2018, of which 733,000 barrels accounted for crude oil and 68,000 barrels for condensate, while 6,000 barrels of oil products were exported.
In the previous report, the organization reduced the forecast for daily production for the next year by 10,000 barrels, to 790,000 barrels.
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