Development programme will fail in Algeria if oil prices reteated to less than 80$

Economic expert and the Assembly of the markets’ economic development’ s president, Abderrahmane Mebtoul, warned about the continuous rise of profits’ losses, resulting from the collaps of oil prices in the international markets during the last weeks, where the price of an oil barrel loses 45$ in less than a month.

• The professor Mebtoul Abderrahmane told Echorouk that Algeria is subjected to a double loss due to the link of the natural gas prices with oil barrels, as well as Algeria’s concentration during the past decades to conclude gas deals with Europ in the medium and long terms, before adding that the loss ( retreat ) in profits will reach one billion $ during 2008 and 2009 on the basis of exports in about 2.6 million barrels per day, whenever oil prices retreated with one$ in the global markets.
• The speaker called on the government to immediate revision of the long-term contracts, to reduce the heavy losses in profits, pointing out that the current prices of gas represents a loss in profits by 25% for each exported quantity of gas equivalent to oil, and a loss up to 50% for the exported quantity annually to the outside and that ecxeeds 63 billion m3 by the end of last year.
• Abderrahmane Mebtoul explained that the report issued by the group SONATRACH reveals that Algeria’s fuels (oil and natural gas) production reached 233 million tons annually of which 134 million tons directed for export compared with 99 million tons of oil which are consumed locally, equivalent to 42% of Algeria’s production.