Oman Backs Extending Crude Supply Cut Deal

Oman is ready to back an extension of the current agreement between 24 oil producing countries to cut crude output to support prices, a senior Omani official said Monday.

"We support any initiative to strengthen and grow the oil price," Oil and Gas Undersecretary Salim al-Aufi said at a press briefing in Muscat. "If that means extending the agreement for another six months, we would not be a blocker of the agreement," Platts reported. While complying with any such deal to extend output cuts, Oman would, however, continue to build its production capacity and reserves, Aufi added, putting the sultanate in a strong position to restore its total crude and condensate output to above 1 million barrels per day in short order, should the cap on crude production be lifted for any reason.

Oman in December 2016 agreed to cut monthly crude production by 45,000 bpd from October's near-record high of 923,000 bpd for six months starting January as its obligation under the unprecedented agreement between OPEC and a group of other major international oil producers to cooperate on limiting output.

That deal followed OPEC's November 30 decision to cut the group's total crude production by 1.2 million bpd, provided certain other producers, notably Russia, also agreed to throttle back output.