Iran has officially reached the four million barrel-per-day (bpd) crude production mark less than three quarters after reentering global oil markets, according to Ali Kardor, the managing director of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC).
IRNA news agency said Kardor made the remarks while addressing officials from the Ministry of Petroleum. He said Iran has maintained its 14 percent production quota as part of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
The executive also said the state-owned firm would be looking to increase output.
"Our oil production capacity should reach 5.2 or 5.7 million bpd," Kardor said.
Tehran has insisted for months that it would be ready for an OPEC production freeze once it regains pre-sanctions output of 4 million bpd. It pumped 3.7 million bpd in August and reached 3.8 million bpd in September, OPEC figures show.
"Iran will cooperate with OPEC to help the oil market recover, but expects others to respect its rights to regain its lost share of the market," Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh told the oil ministry's news agency SHANA in August.
Last week's informal OPEC meeting in Algiers produced the general outline of the freeze deal, though the exact production limits for each member nation have yet to be finalized.
CNBC reported on Monday that President Hassan Rouhani had contacted his Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro and told him that it was essential for all oil producing countries - whether or not they are a part of OPEC - to contribute to the stabilization of international oil markets.
Oil prices went up one percent when news of the two leaders' telephone conversation broke.
"It's kind of a light volume day and we're moving from headline to headline, but still Iran telling Venezuela that all countries are going to have to join this production cut is gaining traction because there are many who want to believe this deal will get done," Phil Flynn, from Price Futures Group, said.
By Zainab Calcuttawala for Oilprice.com
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Zainab Calcuttawala is an American journalist based in Morocco. She completed her undergraduate coursework at the University of Texas at Austin (Hook’em) and reports on… More