Oil exports beginning to get back to normal

www.vheadline.com Posted: Thursday, March 06, 2003 By: Robert Rudnicki

Following last week's drop in oil production by 500,000 barrels per day due to a build up in storage tankers caused by a reduction in exports, Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) has almost completely recovered the 500,000 drop as exports begin to normalize.

Storage tanks were partially emptied on Tuesday following the loading of around three million barrels of oil at the Jose terminal, after the company contracted extra tankers to speed up the export process.

With this recovery in production the government now estimates that production is back to just over two million barrels per day, however, rebel PDVSA executives claim only 1.6 million barrels a day are currently being produced.