Sopuruchi Onwuka — Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) may soon honor Nigeria's quest for increased production quota as output from the country continues to improve.

The exporters' group is will also continue to use the dollar as the medium of transaction in marketing of crude oil across the globe despite proposals from some members that have diplomatic seams with the United States.

The group also dismissed the American Energy Plan as no threat to the global demand for the oil as the fuel of the future.

Secretary General of OPEC, Mr. Abdalla El-Badri, who was on a working visit to Nigeria told journalist at briefing in Abuja weekend that a combination of increasing production from Nigeria and corresponding demand rise in the market brightens Nigeria's demand for higher quota in the exporters' group.

He said sustained rise in the nation's oil production would provide the justification needed to approve higher production quota for Nigeria which have suffered production cut backs in recent years due to security tension in the Niger Delta region.

However, the nation's cumulative production has significantly recovered following the amnesty program evolved by the fe4deral government as a lasting resolution of issues that lead to violence in the region.

Minister of Petroleum Resources, Dr. Rilwanu Lukman, disclosed weekend that the nation's crude oil and condensate output has risen from the lows of about one million barrels per day at the beginning of the year to about 2.3 million barrels per day.

He said that the new figure which is over 500, 000 barrels per day above the country's production quota in OPEC did not however break the group's production restriction on the nation.

According to him, about 1.7 million barrels per day of the total was oil output while about 500, 000 barrels per day was condensate which, he confirmed, is not within OPEC's production control.

OPEC bases its production allocation to members on each nation's capacity for physical barrels, explaining the inequality in the production volumes allocated to members of the group.

Mr. El-Badri said OPEC however does not interfere in member country's internal policies and relationships with other countries, explaining that calls and moves by some member countries to dump the dollar as the currency of oil export markets were not a collective decision of the group.

Iran and Venezuela, whose governments have strained relationships with the United States, have separately called for the change of the dollar as the medium of oil trade with Iran experimenting on the move with few transactions in the Euro.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said Saturday that he supports the replacement of the U.S. dollar as the standard currency used in the international oil trade.

"We've been talking about this in OPEC. Venezuela agrees and there are other countries, such as Iran and Russia that have also proposed this idea," Chavez told reporters in the central Bolivian region of Cochabamba, where he was attending a summit of leftist Latin American presidents.

As a result of the global economic slowdown, oil prices have plummeted. Countries like Venezuela that rely heavily on revenue from oil exports are feeling the economic pinch more than others.

The U.S. dollar has also declined in value, and some OPEC countries seeking stabilization in the oil and currency markets are interested in replacing the U.S. dollar with a basket of currencies.

According to Press TV, Iran has received 85 percent of its oil revenues in currencies other than the US dollar since October 2007, and Tehran is determined to find a substitute for the US dollar for the other 15 percent of oil revenues.

The OPEC scribe said whereas OPEC was not considering any alternative for the dollar, any such thought would need a lot of time to materialize as the American currency has associated with oil deals for over 50 years pf the group.

He said it would take a lot of time to exit the use of the dollar as most non-members of the group rely on the currency for international transaction, especially in oil deals. He added that any other currency that would change the dollar must have the same level of global acceptance.

Mr. El-Badri said OPEC would not compel any member country to accept any particular currency, insisting that it would be the country's internal decisions which OPEC would not endorse as its decision.