Venezuela will increase oil output by the end of January to two-thirds the amount the world's fifth-largest supplier was producing before a national strike began earlier this month, state oil company President Ali Rodriguez said.
Exports have dropped to about 11 percent of pre-strike levels with Venezuela now producing between 600,000 and 700,000 barrels a day, he said at a press conference. That's more than quadruple the output that strikers estimate. Output will rise to 800,000 barrels a day next week and 2 million by the end of next month, he said.
The figures contradict previous, more optimistic forecasts made by President Hugo Chavez's government, all of which have drawn skepticism from industry analysts who say it will take several months to restart refineries and production plants. The strike in Venezuela, which had been supplying about 9 percent of oil used in the US, has pushed up the price of crude to two-year highs and forced Venezuela to import gasoline to alleviate fuel shortages.
"The first step to ending the strike is to normalize the situation," said Rodriguez, who heads Petroleos de Venezuela SA.
Only one of three refineries in the country is operating -- the plant at Puerto La Cruz, he said. That refinery is producing 60,000 barrels a day of gasoline and an unspecified amount of other products, compared with 130,000 barrels a day before the strike.
Exports since the strike began Dec. 2 have totaled about 6.2 million barrels of oil, compared with the 57.6 million barrels the country normally would have shipped, Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez, 65, said on Union Radio in Venezuela, citing his estimate that oil production was already at half pre-strike levels, was inaccurate. Asked whether he sticks by a previous forecast that oil operations would return to normal by mid-January, Rodriguez said he wouldn't make projections.
Crude oil for February delivery rose US$0.23, or 0.7 percent, to US$32.72 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday, the highest closing price since Nov. 30, 2000.
Strikers are demanding Chavez, whose term expires in 2006, to step down or call early elections. Chavez has refused, saying the constitution allows for him to schedule a referendum on his presidency in August at the earlier.
The former lieutenant colonel, who was deposed for two days in April in a failed military coup, is blamed by his opponents for violating private property rights, curbing press freedoms and driving the economy into recession.
Rodriguez said the state oil company currently employs about 33,000 workers.
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