Iraq said most international oil companies working in the country, along with the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan, have agreed to cut crude output to fulfill an OPEC accord.
Iraq is fully committed to delivering on OPEC’s Nov. 30 agreement to reduce supplies, Oil Minister Jabbar al-Luaibi said Thursday in Cairo at a meeting of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, known as OAPEC.
“Kurdistan is within Iraq and we are in agreement,” said al-Luaibi.
The Kurdistan Regional Government, which accounts for about 12 percent of the nation’s output, said on Dec. 5 it didn’t expect to make significant output cutbacks to fulfill the OPEC accord. The KRG didn’t immediately respond when asked for comment. Genel Energy Plc and Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd., which operate in the region, declined to comment, while DNO ASA, which also produces there, didn’t immediately respond.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries resolved on Nov. 30 to reduce production by 1.2 million barrels a day in an effort to end a three-year supply glut and buoy prices. The plan was widened on Dec. 10 when 11 non-members including Russia and Kazakhstan promised to join in the cuts.
Iraq, OPEC’s second-biggest producer after Saudi Arabia, pledged to trim output by 210,000 barrels a day, or 4.5 percent of its total production. The country initially resisted the plan to reduce supply, saying it deserved to be exempt while battling Islamic State militants and reviving its oil industry after years of conflict and sanctions.
Iraq is in talks to supply crude to Egypt, al-Luaibi said. Saudi Arabian Oil Co., known as Saudi Aramco, has halted shipments of oil products to Egypt since October, forcing the Arab world’s most populous nation to buy fuels on global markets at a higher cost.
Separately, Iraq’s oil-rich Kirkuk province, under the protection of the Kurds since 2014, said it’s willing to reduce crude production if required.
The northern province is prepared to reduce output if the decrease is “proportional” with the country’s other regions, Ahmed Al-Askari, head of Kirkuk province’s oil, energy and industry committee, said by phone. It hasn’t yet received an official request to cut production. The state-run North Oil Co. pumps about 160,000 to 170,000 barrels a day from the region, home to Iraq’s oldest producing wells.
--With assistance from Salma El Wardany Tamim Elyan Angelina Rascouet Sam Wilkin and Mikael Holter To contact the reporters on this story: Wael Mahdi in Kuwait at wmahdi@bloomberg.net, Grant Smith in London at gsmith52@bloomberg.net, Khalid Al-Ansary in Erbil at kalansary@bloomberg.net. To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nayla Razzouk at nrazzouk2@bloomberg.net, Dylan Griffiths, John Deane
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