Oil price stability pledge

Saudi Arabia will help alleviate global financial stress by maintaining stable oil markets and boost its own economy by funding infrastructure projects as spending in the oil sectors is likely to exceed $400 billion over the next five years.

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia said that his country will do all they can to help to maintain stable oil prices so as not to stoke the global financial stress further.

The statement at the summit with the Group of 20 leaders indicated the Saudi plan is to continue with government spending on projects and services, although no action has been taken by the government in response to Gordon Brown’s statement that Saudi Arabia should contribute more to the International Monetary Fund and help emerging markets amid the global financial crisis.

Saudi Arabia were the only Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) representatives at the G20 summit along with the members: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the US, the UK and the European Union.

Within the statement, Abdullah said partly as a response to Brown that many sacrifices have been made already including extra production capacity which is at 2 million barrels a day.

However this is bad news following the OPEC announcement that output will be cut by 1.5 million barrels a day in order to meet output quotas.

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