OPEC Ministers Tell of Progress on Quotas

OPEC officials are beginning to make progress toward an agreement that would assign the 13 exporters new, permanent production quotas in an effort to buoy prices, delegates said today.

“Today there is noticeable progress in tackling the quota problem,” United Arab Emirates Oil Minister Mana Said Oteiba said in an interview.

Optimism that an accord may be reached at the meeting here also was expressed by Kuwaiti Oil Minister Ali al Khalifa al Sabah.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries has never found it easy to set production controls that please all the members. A stopgap accord that drove prices from around $9 in July to around $14 now expires Oct. 31.

Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, both major exporters, are among states that say present quotas are unfair and oppose simply extending the stopgap agreement.

“There will be no change in my position, even if I am in a minority of one, which I am not,” Kuwait’s minister told reporters.

But, asked if there was the political will to achieve the quota reallocation that he sought, he replied: “I certainly hope so. That is what we came here to decide.”

Several other ministers have said they favor a simple renewal of the stopgap agreement if permanent quotas are not agreed to here.

But now, delegates say, the focus of the talks is firmly on a new quota agreement, and discussion of a “rollover” of the stopgap agreement has faded into the background.

“For the time being, the option of extending the accord is being discarded. We decided not to talk about an extension at all,” a delegate said. “Most countries believe a permanent agreement is a better deal than the possibility of an extension of the current accord.”

The conference assigned Indonesian Oil Minister Subroto, one of OPEC’s most accomplished mediators, to chair an experts’ committee that is preparing detailed quota proposals for the conference. The work is taking time, delegates said.

Earlier, Iranian Oil Minister Gholamreza Aghazadeh said that, failing an agreement on quotas, the stopgap curbs would be renewed, but the main goal is a new quota deal. Aghazadeh said in an interview: “What is for sure is that we don’t expect any reduction in oil prices.”

OPEC is “doing its utmost to get an agreement on quotas,” he said.