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| Business Words in the News
Friday 23 November 2001
Vocabulary from the business news. Listen to and read the report then find explanations of difficult words below.
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The price of oil
Summary: The OPEC cartel wants to reduce the amount of oil pumped, in order increase the price which has fallen a lot since September. But the important non-OPEC player, Russia, has not yet committed itself to any big cuts. This report from Lesley Curwen.
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| | The News | |
| | | Every global oil producer wants to see the price of oil go up - it's fallen by thirty percent in the last few months, as it's become clear that the demand for fuel is falling because the global economy is slowing down. The question is, how to achieve higher prices. OPEC is used to engineering them by reducing the amount of oil it produces. But it's worried that to act alone, without including its big rivals outside OPEC would do it a severe disadvantage. Its members would pump less oil, while the non-OPEC nations kept the taps open - and so OPEC would lose precious income, and its share of the market. That's why its leaders last week announced they will only make a large cut of 1.5 million barrels a day, if non-0PEC nations join in, to the tune of 500,000 barrels a day.
That prospect has now moved a step closer, as Norway, a non-OPEC producer, has offered substantial cuts of up to 200,000 barrels a day. Two other non-OPEC nations, Mexico and Oman, have already pledged a reduction of 125 thousand barrels a day. But the position of Russia, by far the biggest exporter outside OPEC, remains uncertain. So far it has only offered a tiny cut. The Russian prime minister is expected to meet representatives of his country's oil companies on Friday to discuss possible action.
LESLEY CURWEN, BUSINESS REPORTER, BBC NEWS
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| | The Words
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| | | oil producer
a company or country that provides a large amount of something, in this case, oil
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| | | demand
firm request
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| | | global economy
the world wide method by which money, industry and trade are organised
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| | | engineering
causing something to happen in a clever or indirect way
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| | | rivals
competitors
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| | | OPEC
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
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| | | income
the money that a country or person receives
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| | | share of the market
the percentage of a product sold in a particular country over a particular period of time
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| | | cut
a reduction
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| | | exporter
a person or country that sells things to another country
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