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London: World oil demand growth is set to remain strong in 2007 at nearly double prior year levels led by US and Chinese demand, maintaining pressure on members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) to boost output, a Reuters poll showed yesterday.
"Opec crude production would need to increase in the second half of the year from current levels... The bottom line is that Opec will need to add barrels to the market this winter," JP Morgan's global head of energy strategy Katherine Spector wrote in a note.
A poll of 21 analysts by Reuters forecast average world oil demand growth this year at 1.41 million barrels per day, up from 1.39 million barrels in a previous poll last March. That is up from 800,000 bpd last year, according to the International Energy Agency.
On the rise
The poll also showed demand for Opec crude oil rising 890,000 barrels a day to 31.23 million barrels a day, up from 30.46 million in the previous poll.
Opec, source of more than a third of the world's oil, cut output by 500,000 bpd from last February 1 on top of a 1.2 million bpd cut that took effect in November last year.
It has so far resisted calls to reverse its output cuts, saying the world oil market remains well supplied with crude and refinery bottlenecks were mostly to blame for tightness in transport fuels.
Opec secretary-general Abdullah Al Badri repeated this on Tuesday, suggesting that the 12-member group would hold output steady when it meets on September 11 in Vienna.
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