NEW DELHI: The announcement last week by big oil consumer countries including the US, Japan and India to release crude oil from their Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) failed to trigger the expected immediate effect of bringing down fuel prices, instead driving them higher, but news of the new variant of COVID-19 discovered in South Africa served to achieve this objective.
In a coordinated move with other big global oil consumers such as the US and Japan, India last week decided to release five million barrels of crude oil from its strategic petroleum reserve. The purpose was to cut the cost of growing fuel prices in the international market, which touched a new high in 2021. The decision was welcomed by the international community but the moot question was whether it would serve the purpose of cooling down the oil price. Let’s find out the implications.
