RI to get additional quota of 26,000 barrels of crude

Indonesia will get an additional export quota of 26,000 barrels of crude per day following the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries' decision to increase the cartel's crude oil supply by 500,000 barrels per day (bpd).

OPEC Ali Rodriquez Araque was quoted by OPEC News Agency as saying on Monday that 10 OPEC member countries should prepare the production increase from now on, and therefore the increase could be made effective by the end of this month, to make OPEC's crude supply increasing to 25.9 million bpd.

With an additional quota of 26,000 bpd, Indonesia's total export quota of crude would increase to 1.343 million bpd.

Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, would get the largest increase in export quota, namely by 162,000 bpd to a total of 8.415 bpd, followed by Iran with an increase of 73,000 bpd, Venezuela (58,000 bpd), Uni Emirate Arab (44,000 bpd), Nigeria (41,000 bpd), Kuwait (40,000 bpd), Libya (27,000 bpd), Algeria (16,000 bpd) and Qatar (13,000 bpd).

Rodriquez said earlier that the ideal crude oil prices now should range from between $22 to $28 per barrel.

"If the prices fall below US$22 per barrel, it would be difficult for the market to restore the prices to a normal level. We don't want the disaster in 1998-1999 (when crude oil prices touched $10 a barrel) to occur again," he said.

Because of the high oil prices, currently staying at $30 a barrel, Saudi is under pressure from the West to initiate efforts to increase production to bring down oil prices. Saudi then surprised OPEC members by announcing that it would unilaterally increase its crude production by 800,000 bpd on top of the 500,000 bpd from OPEC.

Saudi's decision was then sparked criticism from other OPEC members, including Indonesia.

Saudi then proposed an extraordinary meeting for OPEC to review the current production level. Again Saudi's proposal met with oppositions from a number of countries, including Indonesia. (*)