Just a day after Russia’s Energy Minister Alexander Novak said that the OPEC/non-OPEC production cut pact was working and that there was no need to make immediate additional moves, an energy minister official told Russian reporters on Friday that Moscow was ready to review proposals from partners in the deal, including changes to production cuts.
On Thursday, Minister Novak told Reuters in an interview that the output cut deal was working to reduce global oversupply and price volatility, and there was no need to make immediate additional moves to lift the price of oil.
“We believe that it is necessary to move within the framework of the agreed decisions and that new, snap decisions are not necessary,” Novak told Reuters.
The minister was echoing the words of four Russian government officials who told Bloomberg on Wednesday that Russia would oppose any attempts to deepen the oil production cuts currently in effect in OPEC and 11 other oil producers.
But today, Russian media quoted an official from the energy ministry who told reporters that at the July 24 meeting of the Joint OPEC-Non-OPEC Ministerial Monitoring Committee (JMMC) in St. Petersburg, that Russia would be ready to consider any proposals by its partners regarding the parameters of the production cut deal, if the need arises.
Some analysts have suggested that oil prices could plunge to US$30 a barrel in 2018 and maintain that low price level for some two years, should OPEC fail to make steeper output cuts.
Although Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh was quoted as saying last month that OPEC producers were holding discussions on potentially deepening the cuts, OPEC delegates and sources told Reuters last week that the cartel would not be hurrying to make steeper cuts.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
