OPEC cuts global oil forecast again

The oil exporters' group has lowered its estimate of how much crude the world will need this year even as members flout quota commitments.

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OPEC has again cut its forecast for how much of its crude the world will need this year, even as its members continue to flout their quota commitments. The oil exporters' group, which controls 40 per cent of the world's oil supply, said its members would need to pump 28.81 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil this year, down by about 135,000 bpd from its projection a month ago. The group left its forecast for world oil demand this year unchanged and said producers from outside OPEC would meet the projected 1.1 per cent increase in global consumption. Those countries are expected to increase their output by a combined 500,000 bpd this year - 25 per cent more than OPEC predicted last month.

"Anticipated growth continues to be driven by Brazil, the US, Russia, Colombia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan," the OPEC secretariat said in its latest monthly report, released today. At the same time, OPEC said its members' compliance with the record supply cuts they agreed to in late 2008 fell to 53 per cent last month from a revised level of 55 per cent in February. @Email:tcarlisle@thenational.ae