Iraqi oil minister confirms OPEC is considering possible cut extension

Iraqi Oil Minister Jabar Ali al-Luaibi revealed, on Sunday, that the Secretary General of OPEC is studying whether to extend into the second half of this year a global agreement on reducing oil output.

A source in the oil sector stressed that the average exports of Iraqi oil from the south reached to 3.163 million barrels per day, since the beginning of March, due to bad weather and the decline in production by maintenance processes, as the country seeks to abide by OPEC's agreement to reduce oil production more.

Al-Luaibi explained to reporters that there are encouraging factors suggest the improvement of the oil market, and that Iraq will support any measures to help stabilize the market and prices, if agreed by all OPEC's members, noting that his country's production in March reached 4.31 million barrels per day.

Iraq, OPEC's second largest producer, is under pressure to cut its production under the global deal to reduce production between OPEC producers and non-OPEC producers. Sources said that production in March fell by more than 210 thousand barrels per day, the size of the reduction required from Iraq in the OPEC agreement. 

Production from Rumaila, the country's largest field, fell by about 70,000 bpd to 1.380 million due to maintenance work. Iraq has also cut about 210,000 barrels per day from southern fields operated by international oil companies and other fields run by national oil companies.