G7 Group Discusses Release of Oil Reserves to Maintain Global Supply
JAKARTA - Finance ministers from the Group of Seven (G7) countries discussed the possibility of coordinated oil reserve releases in an online meeting on Monday (9/3) which also involved the International Energy Agency (IEA), amid a spike in oil prices due to the joint invasion of the United States (US) and Israel against Iran.
"We agreed to take steps to support global energy supply and other necessary steps," Japanese Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama told reporters after the meeting.
He added that the IEA called for immediate efforts to release oil reserves together.
He also said G7 energy ministers would hold talks in the near future to discuss details of the possible release of the oil reserves.
IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol, who also participated in the G7 finance ministers' meeting, said in a statement that global oil market conditions "have deteriorated in recent days," citing reduced oil production and challenges in transit through the Strait of Hormuz.
"This creates a significant and growing risk for the market. We are discussing all available options, including providing IEA emergency oil reserves to the market," he said in a statement.
According to the IEA, member countries currently have more than 1.2 billion barrels of public emergency oil reserves, with an additional 600 million barrels of industrial reserves stored under government obligations.
The US and Japan together have about 700 million barrels of the total public oil reserves.
French Finance Minister Roland Lescure reportedly said after a meeting of G7 members that they had not made a decision on the possibility of releasing emergency oil reserves.
In recent years, the release of oil reserves coordinated by the IEA has been carried out in 2022 to maintain oil market stability after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The Financial Times, which first reported on the G7 discussions before the meeting took place, said the US was among a number of countries that expressed support for a joint release of oil reserves.
The newspaper also reported that a number of US officials considered a joint release in the range of 300 million to 400 million barrels, or about 25 to 30 percent of the total reserves of 1.2 billion barrels, to be the right move, with the newspaper citing a source who asked not to be named.
The G7 (Group of Seven) consists of seven major advanced economies in the world, consisting of the US, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Germany, Canada and France.
This group focuses on global economic, security, and energy issues, and is supported by the European Union as a non-enumerated member.
As a non-enumerated member, the EU is an actively supported and supported partner, but its formal status is different from the member states listed in the G7 master list (enumeration).