OPEC Needs To Spend $60B To Meet World Oil Demand

OPEC oil producers will need to invest $60 billion by 2010 to meet world oil demand, the group's president said. "To maintain its 1995 production level and make its proportionate share of the additional amounts, OPEC would need to invest about $60 billion by the year 2010 and another $250 billion by 2020," Abdullah al-Attiyah, also Qatari oil minister, told a conference. "World oil demand, which was about 70 million barrels per day in 1995, is expected to be more than 90 million bpd in 2010 and more than 100 million bpd in 2020," he added. Attiyah urged investors, producers and consumers to devise "mutually acceptable mechanisms for the sharing of investment risks to assure sufficient oil supply well into the next century." "OPEC will attract substantial investment capital, because, in addition to having the world's largest reserves, they also have some of the lowest production costs in the world," Attiyah said.