TEHRAN - Iran’s oil minister said that the country is currently exporting crude oil to 17 countries, including some in Europe.

Iran will not face any problem in exporting oil no matter who comes to power in the US, Javad Oji stressed.

Speaking at a ceremony on Tuesday, he stated that good investment has been made in the past three years in the oil industry.

Iran produced 2.2 million barrels of oil per day (bpd) at the outset of the administration of the late President Ebrahim Raisi (August 2021) but the current oil production rat is about 3.570 million bpd, showing a considerable hike, Oji underlined.

He went on to say that Iran’s oil exports rose from 182 million barrels in 2019 to 565 million barrels last year.

In addition, the value of the export of oil and gas condensates and other oil and petrochemical products rose from $10.8 billion in 2019 to $36 billion last year, registering a 3.5fold growth, the oil minister added.

Iran has risen to become the fourth largest oil exporter within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) due to a surge in oil production and sales.

Iran's oil and gas condensate exports have now reached their highest level since 2018, when the United States withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and introduced tough economic sanctions against the country, targeting its oil sales in particular, according to a report by Vortexa, which provides data on the global energy sector.

The report emphasized that Iran's oil and gas condensate exports now account for 9% of OPEC's total crude oil and gas condensate exports.

Iran exported 1.56 million barrels of oil per day from January to May of this year, 250,000 bpd more than Kuwait and Nigeria. This has elevated Iran's ranking to the fourth spot among OPEC's largest crude oil exporters.

Despite Western sanctions, Iran managed to increase its crude oil and gas exports to 1.7 million bpd in May, the highest level in the past five years.

The report cited the rise in Chinese oil demand and the expansion of Iran's oil tanker fleet as the main factors contributing to the surge in Iran's oil exports.

EF/