Global oil demand to increase by 5.8 mln barrels per day in 2021: OPEC

CAIRO - 12 February 2021: The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries' (OPEC) latest monthly report showed that the 2021 global oil demand growth forecast got revised down to 5.79 million barrels per day (bpd) from 5.9 million bpd in the previous report.

"Global economy is showing signs of a healthy recovery in 2021 but oil demand is currently lagging." the report added.

"Oil demand is forecast to pick up in the second half of 2021."

"2021 overall non-OPEC supply growth forecast lowered to 670,000 bpd (previous forecast 850,000 bpd)."

"OPEC oil output rose 180,000 bpd in January to 25.50 million bpd."

"2021 forecast for global demand for OPEC crude hiked to 27.5 million bpd (previous forecast 27.2 million bpd)."

While the pandemic continues to dominate world economic developments, prospects for improvements in the containment of COVID-19 are rising, said OPEC.

It predicted that economic activity would "significantly gain pace" by the end of June 2021, as the impact of the pandemic would taper off, and the momentum is expected to be supported by pent-up demand, especially in the contact-intensive services sectors like tourism, leisure and hospitality.

Nonetheless, numerous challenges still remain, including COVID-19 variants and the effectiveness of vaccines against these mutations, it added.

Moreover, sovereign debt in most economies has risen to levels at which an increase in interest rates could cause severe fiscal strain, according to the report.