International Energy Agency once again lowered the forecast for oil prices.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) lowered the forecast for world oil demand in 2009 to 570 thousand barrels per day, reports AFP. According to a new forecast, oil consumption as a result of this year amount to 84.7 million barrels per day. In January IEA has lowered the forecast for the current year to one million barrels. According to experts IEA, reducing the value of demand for oil in 2009 would be the strongest since 1982.
At this level of oil demand in 2009 will be 1.1 percent less than in 2008, when he was at the level of 85.7 million barrels per day. It should be noted that in 2008, also have reduced demand for oil compared to 2007.
Calculations IEA, which lowers its forecasts to the end of 2008 because of falling demand for minerals, based on data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). At the end of January 2009 the IMF issued a forecast that the global economy this year will grow only at 0.5 percent. In doing so, the growth rate of world GDP would be the lowest since the Second World War.
Now oil is traded in world markets at around 35 dollars a barrel, far below the record marks the summer of 2008, when the price of raw materials reached 147 dollars a barrel. In order to support oil prices, the Organization of the countries - exporters of petroleum (OPEC) in recent months reduced its oil production to 4.2 million barrels a day. The Secretary-General of the OPEC Abdalla Salem El-Badri has promised a new quota reduction of oil production if prices continue to fall.
Specialists IEA notes that one of the effects of reducing the cost of oil will delay new investments in production, causing shortages of fuel, when the world economy out of crisis. For example, the members of OPEC have postponed production on 35 new oil fields due to low prices. According to OPEC, the oil price should not be less than 50 dollars a barrel, to the participating countries cartel to balance their budgets and invest in new projects.