Saudi Arabia, the global leading oil exporter said that it is able to satisfy its customer’s demand for oil but also said that output had dropped in March, according to an AFP report.
The Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi who arrived in Kuwait on Sunday to attend an Asian energy ministers’ meeting, said: “Saudi Arabia will supply whatever customers ask for,” adding that the market was “over-supplied” and that Asian demand was “very strong”.
He did however admit that Saudi Arabia’s output had fallen to 8.29 million barrels a day (bpd) in March from 9.1 million bpd in the previous month, the news agency reported.
Al-Naimi hesitantly said that he expected production in April to be higher than in March.
Nobua Tanaka, head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) who also arrived in Kuwait for the meeting, said: “Certainly current oil prices are very high… (we are) alarmed that it could negatively impact the economic growth.”
He said that leading consumers such as the US and China were having to reduce economic growth due to the high oil price and appealed to OPEC to be “as flexible as possible” in easing the situation.
