Petrobras to Help Iraq Raise Oil Output Above 2 Million Barrels

Iraq, the fifth-largest oil producer in the Middle East, will seek the advice of Petroleo Brasileiro SA, Brazil’s state-controlled oil company, to help boost oil production, which has fallen 47 percent in the past five years.

Iraq’s oil ministry plans to set up a “technical committee” with the Rio de Janeiro-based oil company, known as Petrobras, to advise its state-run production companies on increasing output, now less than 2 million barrels a day, Jabbar al-Leaby, director of South Oil Co., Iraq’s largest oil producer, said in a telephone interview from Basra today. Leaby was part of a delegation that visited Brazil earlier this month to meet Petrobras.