ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies will increase oil production by almost two million barrels per day (bpd) from May following a meeting on Thursday.
OPEC+ will increase its output by 350,000 bpd in May, another 350,000 bpd in June and approximately 440,000 bpd in July, according to the organisation led by Saudi Arabia and Russia. Saudi Arabia will also increase its production by 1 million bpd following previous cuts.
OPEC has worked to reduced production quotas since early last year as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Iraq failed to meet the agreed reduced rate in the summer, angering its OPEC counterparts. Baghdad then promised to compensate for the overproduction by making significant cuts in July, August, and September of 2020.
Iraq is the second-largest oil producer in OPEC, outranked only by Saudi Arabia, which leads the organization.
With the start of the vaccination process in many countries, the global price of oil has risen – good news for Iraq, which is highly reliant on oil exports to fund its economy.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi visited Riyadh this week, where Iraq and Saudi Arabia agreed to maintain energy cooperation to maintain stability in global oil markets.
Oil prices and exports from Iraq increased last month, according to oil ministry figures published by the State Organization for the Marketing of Oil (SOMO) on Thursday.
A total of $5.8 billion in oil revenues was recorded in March, up from just over $5 billion in February.
The average price of one barrel stood at $63.3 in March, up from $60.5 the previous month.
