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Aramco CEO sees Oil Demand Rising from 2010: Report | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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LONDON (Reuters) – World oil demand could rise at a “reasonable pace” as the global economy recovers more and oil prices in the “$70s” a barrel are in a healthy range, the head of Saudi Arabia’s state oil company told the Financial Times.

Saudi Aramco CEO Khalid Al-Falih was quoted in the paper’s Thursday edition as saying world oil demand could rise by 1 million barrels per day (bpd) to 1.5 million bpd a year from 2010 and beyond. Demand has been contracting in 2009 due to recession.

Even so, Saudi Aramco has cut its upstream maintenance budget to $4 billion-$5 billion a year from $7 billion a year due to the global economic crisis, he told the paper.

The Manifa oilfield is expected to add 900,000 bpd to Saudi Arabia’s oil capacity around 2013, later than an earlier target of 2011, the newspaper said, because of the recent fall in oil demand.