Venezuela’s Oil Firm Proposes Barter System To Continue Trade with India

Venezuela is willing to increase the share of the crude oil supply to India. The Oil Minister of Venezuela said that Venezuela is also thinking about the barter payment system to gain access into the Indian market. 

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After the United States imposed sanctions on Venezuela’s state oil firm PDVSA in a bid to push out President Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela which buys medicines and other products from India is searching for alternative payment methods.

Venezuela’s Oil Minister emphasised saying, “The relationships with India will continue, the trade will continue.” The minister informed media at the conference that Venezuela intended to double oil supplies to India from 300,000 barrels per day. “India also wants to increase the intake,” Quevedo added.

The U.S. government issued its worst sanctions against PDVSA, restricting companies based in Venezuela and U.S. subsidiaries from transferring proceeds of oil sales to PDVSA’s bank accounts until a new government being formed by Congress head Juan Guaido sets up new foreign accounts.

Both Reliance Industries Ltd and Nayara Energy buy Venezuelan oil. Barter deals could help India balance its trade with Venezuela. In fiscal 2017/18, India’s imports from Venezuela were worth $5.87 billion while its exports were $79.3 million, Indian trade ministry data showed.

The minister said it was important to listen to oil-consuming nations as OPEC and other producers to balance supply and demand in the oil market. The U.S. sanctions meant Venezuela had lost $20 billion in revenues.

Quevedo validated  Venezuela’s efforts to remove the two U.S. executives from the board by saying, “The U.S. exercises kidnapping of resources around the world … It is financial persecution. Now they want to steal Citgo Petroleum from Venezuela.”

Notwithstanding U.S. sanctions, Quevedo stated there was no shortage of gasoline in Venezuela and said the country’s relations with international energy companies continued. “We have the strategic association with several companies around the world and one of those firms was U.S. energy company Chevron,” Quevedo added.

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