The Increasing Importance of Middle Eastern Oil Production Relative to Total World Production: 1990-2015 (Average Daily Production in Millions of Barrels Per Day) Source (http://www.csis.org/mideast/stable/3c.html) Growing World and US Dependence on Imported Oil: 1990-2015 (Average Daily Domestic Production vs. Demand in Millions of Barrels Per Day) Source (http://www.csis.org/mideast/stable/3c.html)Why the increase in total production?(Dr. Ibrahim Oweiss)Since 1974 oil-exporting nations have substantially increased their imports in order to finance development plans and to pay for highly technical military training, equipment, and sophisticated defense systems such as the airborne warning and control system, AWACS. From 1972 to 1983, OPECs imports increased approximately sevenfold. Furthermore, exports to OPEC from OECD as a percentage of the latter's total exports increased from 4.1 percent in l972-73 to 8.8 percent in 1975-82, then to 8.4 percent in 1983; and it dropped to 7.1 percent in 1984. (http://www.georgetown.edu/users/johnsonj/oweiss/petrod/increase.htm)Dynamic forces of oil supply and demand led to all excess supply in world markets since 1980, which in turn led to a de facto decline in the price of oil even before OPEC's London agreement of March 1983 in which the official price was reduced by approximately 14 percent. This oil glut in world markets was the result of at least three mutually dependent dominant forces: high oil prices, increase in production, and reduction in demand.(http://www.georgetown.edu/users/johnsonj/oweiss/petrod/since.htm)First, following the initial leap of 1973 the price of oil was once again drastically increased in l979. This rise led to a substitution of other sources of fuel and a reduction in real income, which contributed eventually to a decline in the demand for oil after a three-year time lag.A second factor in the oil glut was the increase in world oil production--a predictable economic ...
