The International Energy Agency said recently its member countries would unlock 400 million barrels of oil from their reserves – the biggest such release ever – to ease the impact of the Middle East war. ‘The oil market challenges we are facing are unprecedented in scale, therefore I am very glad that IEA member countries have responded with an emergency collective action of unprecedented size,’ IEA executive director Fatih Birol said in a statement. The IEA says the emergency stocks will be made available to the market over a ‘timeframe that is appropriate to the national circumstances’ of each member country.
it is the sixth time the IEA has approved a coordinated release of oil stocks, having previously done so in 1991, 2005, 2011, and twice in 2022, it say