A six-country monitoring committee overseeing the OPEC/non-OPEC production cut deal will recommend a 1 million b/d output rise from current levels, Saudi energy minister Khalid al-Falih said Thursday.
But Falih did not delineate how those barrels would be allocated across the 24 countries participating in the deal, nor an exact ramp-up schedule.
"Naturally it is going to be gradual, very few counties can flick on a switch," he told reporters after the committee met for five hours. "I think it will be over time, it will take weeks, if not months, for these volumes to reach the market so I don't expect a shock to the market."
OPEC and 10 non-OPEC partners led by Russia are in the midst of a 1.8 million b/d supply cut agreement.
Saudi Arabia and Russia have said they would like to ease the quotas to make up for any supply gap caused by declines in sanctions-hit Venezuela and Iran.
But Iran, whose oil minister Bijan Zanganeh walked out of the monitoring committee meeting after an hour despite being invited, is opposed to raising the quotas and insists that members not infringe on other countries' market share.
Falih, in his opening remarks at the monitoring committee meeting, said he foresaw a supply gap in the coming months of 1.7 million b/d that the OPEC/non-OPEC coalition needs to address to prevent a demand-sapping price spike.
Demand in the second half of the year would be 2 million b/d higher than in the first half, Falih forecast. Meanwhile, production among OPEC and its 10 non-OPEC partners in a supply cut agreement has fallen 2.8 million b/d -- 1 million b/d more than originally intended.
