Ecuador says OPEC chief vows to help boost its slowing oil output

OPEC’s secretary general has promised to help Ecuador boost oil production and refining, Ecuador’s Oil Ministry said Sunday, even as the cartel hesitates to increase oil output worldwide.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will help Ecuador, South America’s fifth-largest oil producer, to modernize its oil fields and increase sagging output, Abdalla Salem El-Badri said, according to an Oil Ministry statement.

OPEC will also train Ecuadorean technicians to run a US$5-billion oil refinery that the South American country plans to build on its Pacific coast in co-operation with Venezuela, the statement said, giving no other details.

CanadianPress