By Trevor Hunnicutt

WASHINGTON (Reuters), – On Tuesday, the White House welcomed a decision made by oil producers to continue with plans to increase crude production. They also praised their “close” coordination of activities with Saudi Arabia and UAE.

On Tuesday, a group of producers from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies (Russia) agreed to a plan for an increase of 400,000 barrels daily in February.

Oil prices rose further after the decision to not increase output. Oil prices rose by 50% in the last year, and have risen to $80 so far in 2022. [O/R]

According to a spokesperson from the White House National Security Council, “The administration is focused to ensure that supply increases to meet demand as the global economic recovers” and that Americans experience lower pump prices – which has been a progress made in the past weeks.

A spokesperson said that the OPEC+ decision would help the global economic recovery.

We appreciate our close cooperation with our partners Saudi Arabia and UAE over the past weeks to address the price pressures. We are pleased that OPEC+ has decided to increase production.

Prior to the outbreak, the Biden administration had criticized OPEC+ for causing an identical increase in production and hampered the recovery from recession caused by the COVID-19 epidemic.

Under pressure from sharply rising inflation across a variety of consumer goods and gasoline seller price gouging, the Biden administration announced an announcement from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

OPEC+ (which meets next on February 2), reduced 10 million barrels of production per day during 2020 because demand fell.