OPEC Secretary-General Abdullah al-Badri said despite uncertainties, OPEC members are ready to make investments to respond to the world's future energy needs. Badri also said that a wave of project cancellations and deferrals in the industry was a "clear demonstration that wide price fluctuations have a detrimental effect on investments and can sow the seeds of future instability", in a statement on the International Energy Forum's website. The secretary-general said he saw Asian oil demand rising to almost 46 million barrels per day by 2040, an increase of nearly 16 million barrels per day from 2015, Reuters reported. "Oil-related investment requirements between now and 2040 are estimated at about $10 trillion," he said. The global oil benchmark, Brent Crude, stood at around $115 in June 2014, but prices went down to $70 per barrel last September when overproduction from the United States caused prices to dip. Prices continued to sink to $40-50 in early 2015 after OPEC member-states, and in particular the world's biggest crude exporter Saudi Arabia, decided to keep production unchanged in November 2014.
