OPEC & OPEC+

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is a group consisting of 13 of the world’s major oil-exporting nations.
Countries that belong to OPEC include Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela (the five founders), plus the United Arab Emirates, Libya, Algeria, Nigeria, Angola, Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.
OPEC was founded in 1960 to coordinate the petroleum policies of its members and to provide member states with technical and economic aid.
OPEC is used to work as a cartel and fix prices in a favourable band. It could bring down prices by increasing oil production and raise prices by cutting production.

The 2014 oil crisis, which was accentuated by oversupply of crude, brought down prices below $30 a barrel. Since then, OPEC has been working with non-OPEC countries like Russia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Brunei, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mexico, Oman, Sudan and South Sudan to fix the global prices and supply.
Known as the “OPEC Plus” arrangement, this alliance kept production lower and pumped up the prices.

OPEC and its allies OPEC+ have recently agreed not to increase oil supply in April as they await a more substantial recovery in demand amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
India, the world’s third-biggest oil importer, said the decision by major oil producers to continue with output cuts as prices move higher could threaten the consumption led-recovery in some countries.
India imports about 84% of its oil and relies on West Asian supplies to meet over three-fifths of its demand.

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