DUBAI, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- Suhail Al-Mazrouei, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Minister of Energy and Industry and incumbent President of OPEC, said Saturday "will spare no effort to reach the state of market stability aspired by both producers and consumers," UAE state news agency WAM reported.
The UAE minister and OPEC president also lauded the efforts made by Khalid Al-Falih, Minister of Energy, Industry and Mineral Resources of Saudi Arabia, during his chairmanship of OPEC in 2017.
Al-Mazrouei noted that the Saudi minister exerted "unique efforts that added significant values to the international endeavours to stabilise the market and we are determined to pursue the same path and follow on the constructive and fruitful work performed during 2017."
He added "we are now set to initiate innovative efforts to deliver the future and build on the Declaration of Cooperation reached by OPEC member- and non-member states last year to secure the sustainable development goals."
Earlier last year in November, the oil exporting countries of OPEC and its partners agreed to extend the output cut till the end of 2018, nine months longer than the previous agreement.
Twenty-four countries led by OPEC and non-OPEC member Russia decided to maintain production cut of about 1.8 million barrels per day until Dec. 31, 2018.
The price of oil (Brent) reached a three-year high in January when the "black gold" hovered above 71 dollars a barrel (159 liters), before retreating to a trading range between 60 dollars to 65 dollars a barrel in the wake of the global stock market crash from February 5.
