Search For Oil Stepped Up As Price Rises

The world’s biggest oil producers have significantly boosted investment in oil exploration for the first time in nearly two decades.

The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, the cartel controlling 75 per cent of the world’s oil reserves, on Monday revealed its most important members had drilled 7.5 per cent more wells last year than in 2003 in response to the oil price boom. Opec’s annual statistical bulletin also showed that the number of rigs in operation within the 11-member cartel rose 18.8 per cent last year after dropping by almost 6 per cent a year earlier.
Financial Times