Indonesia says oil prices still high, OPEC should maintain output

Jakarta (Platts)--27Feb2006

Indonesia is in favor of OPEC maintaining its output target when the
group meets to decide on second-quarter production policy Mar 8 in Vienna
because oil prices remain high, a senior delegate told Platts Friday.
     "OPEC should maintain its current quotas because oil prices are still
high. Indonesia hopes that the price of WTI will be about $50/bbl, though we
think that the ideal price would be $40/bbl," said Maizar Rahman, Indonesia's
OPEC governor.
     Global oil demand in the second quarter is estimated to be about 2-mil
b/d lower, Maizar said.
     Benchmark NYMEX light sweet crude futures were trading at $62.00/bbl in
Asia Monday afternoon. They rocketed by over $2/bbl Friday following a foiled
attack by suicide bombers on a major oil treatment center in eastern Saudi
Arabia.
     In the run-up to the Mar 8 meeting, only Venezuela has so far talked
about cutting production. The country's oil minister Rafael Ramirez said Feb
16 that OPEC members are over-producing and could consider cutting output by
between 500,000 b/d and 1-mil b/d at the meeting.
     OPEC member Algeria will argue for maintaining the cartel's current
28-mil b/d ceiling at the upcoming meeting, oil minister Chakib Khelil said
Saturday.
     "Algeria will argue for maintaining the current production ceiling
because reducing it will not serve our interests," Khelil told reporters at a
national television forum.
     OPEC's ten members bound by quotas pumped some 28.15-mil b/d in January,
according to a Platts survey, down from 28.25-mil b/d in December. The group
including Iraq, which does not have a production quota, produced 29.68-mil b/d
last month, the survey found.

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