OPEC charts course for future oil market

The author says OPEC is an economic organization with a simple mission: to provide a stable and reliable supply of oil to its customers and assure a fair return to its producers. When OPEC was formed in 1960, he recalls multinational oil companies dominated the oil market. Their operations were highly integrated from well to pump, and they kept oil prices low to fuel economic growth in prosperous industrialized countries. Host nations were rarely consulted in operations, and they reaped only minimal return for their black gold. OPEC changed all that. Today, OPEC's 13 member countries control their own oil industries, and some even own sizeable investments in the downstream sectors of consuming countries. To meet its commitment for supplying the petroleum needs of industrialized nations by the turn of the century, the author estimates OPEC will need to increase production capacity by about 40% at a cost well above what member countries can afford alone