Rising oil prices, however, means the cost could soar by a third in just one year to $566 billion. "We have seen two years in a row in 2015 and 2016 oil investments declining," International Energy Agency (IEA) chief Fatih Birol said. "This would mean oil security and oil markets may face a challenge as a result of a huge drop in the investments in a very few years in the medium term. "That has a minor impact in the short-term, but if you go out to 2020, it means oil production across the region will have declined significantly." "It is, as you can imagine, hard to replace Saudi Arabia in your import mix for many an Asian refiner."

Source: Economic Times September 04, 2016 04:07 UTC