OPEC+ confirms plans for gradual production increase from April, will halt if market balance disrupted
MOSCOW. March 4 (Interfax) - Members of the OPEC+ coalition which previously announced voluntary oil production cuts will begin gradually increasing output from April as planned, OPEC said in a statement.
The decision was made on March 3 during a conference call involving representatives from Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the UAE, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria and Oman. The meeting assessed the current market situation and its future outlook.
"Taking into account the healthy market fundamentals and the positive market outlook, they [the meeting's participants] re-affirmed their decision agreed upon on December 5, 2024, to proceed with a gradual and flexible return of the 2.2 mbd [million barrels per day] voluntary adjustments starting on 1st April, 2025," OPEC said.
At the same time, OPEC's policy on production increases remains flexible. "This gradual increase may be paused or reversed subject to market conditions. This flexibility will allow the group to continue to support oil market stability," it said.
The gradual production increase will continue until September 2026, it said.
Countries that exceeded their permitted production levels during the period of voluntary cuts (Iraq, Kazakhstan, and Russia) will need to compensate for the excess volumes produced beyond the established quotas. According to the schedule, these OPEC+ participants must complete this by June 2026, but they have agreed to do this "in the earlier months of the compensation period," OPEC said.
The updated compensation schedules must be submitted to the OPEC Secretariat by March 17 and will be published on the organization's website.
Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates will also start increasing production from April due to an increased quota of 300,000 barrels per day. The increase will be gradual, aligning with the schedule for phasing out voluntary cuts.
According to Interfax calculations, taking into account the existing schedules including compensation for violations of the agreement, OPEC+ production in April will increase by 141,000 b/d, reaching 35.594 million b/d.
