The devil's excrement ; Is oil wealth a blessing or a curse?

[krsna]

The devil's excrement

 

 

From The Economist

 

 

Is oil wealth a blessing or a curse?

 

 

 

 

 

 

THREE decades ago, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) sent oil prices rocketing. By 1980, a barrel cost $30, ten times the price in 1970. Consumers suffered, whereas oil producers reaped an enormous windfall. Many assumed then that oil was a gift of God that would transform poor countries into flourishing economies within a generation. Yet even during those heady early days there were doubts. Juan Pablo Pérez Alfonso, a founder of OPEC, complained in 1975: “I call petroleum the devil's excrement. It brings trouble...Look at this locura—waste, corruption, consumption, our public services falling apart. And debt, debt we shall have for years.”

 

Several new publications argue that history has proved him right. A new book from the Open Society Institute, a foundation financed by George Soros, points out that resource-poor countries grew two to three times faster than resource-rich countries between 1960 and 1990 (even after adjusting for differences in population, initial income per head and other variables). Revealingly, the resource-rich countries began to lag only after the 1970s—in other words, only after oil wealth started to pour in.

 

 

 

What causes civil wars?

May 22nd 2003

Preventing civil war

May 22nd 2003

 

 

 

Debt and development

 

Economics

 

Oil

 

 

 

The Open Society Institute publishes “Caspian Oil Windfalls: Who Will Benefit?”. Christian Aid publishes “Fuelling Poverty: Oil, War and Corruption” by Andrew Pendleton et al. The University of California recently hosted a conference on oil and human rights (the website includes links to many papers on the topic). Articles by Michael Ross are online, including “How Does Mineral Wealth Affect the Poor?”. Publish What You Pay campaigns for more openness from big oil companies. Britain's government launched the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative in 2002. See also OPEC.

 

 

 

 

 

Two factors explain this. The main economic problem is known as Dutch Disease, after the effects of the discovery of natural gas in the Netherlands in the 1960s. An oil bonanza causes a sudden rush of foreign earnings; this drives up the value of the currency. That, in turn, makes domestically produced goods less competitive at home and abroad. Over time, domestic manufacturing and agriculture fade and growth suffers.

 

Tricky as this problem is, oil economies such as Norway and Alaska have come up with a clever (though still imperfect) solution: they hive off much of the oil income into “stabilisation” funds, disbursing “dividends” to citizens slowly—directly in Alaska, via social spending in Norway—so that the economy does not overheat. Chile, one of the world's more successful developing countries, has a similar fund for its copper revenues.

 

Contrast this cautious approach with the recklessness of the OPEC countries of the Middle East, which expanded domestic spending by about 50% a year between 1974 and 1979. This enriched the elite, but spawned white-elephant projects and fuelled inflation of more than 15% a year. Venezuela has earned over $600 billion in oil money since the 1970s, but the real income per head of its citizens fell by 15% between 1973 and 1985. It is falling again today.

 

On top of these economic difficulties can come even worse political problems. Because oil infrastructure can be controlled easily by a few, it often leads to a concentration of political power. Michael Ross, of the University of California at Los Angeles, argues that oil worsens poverty by stunting democratic development, among other things. It also tends to cause, or at least aggravate, civil wars. A new report by Christian Aid, a charity, says that oil economies are more likely than non-oil economies to maintain large armies, and generally do worse on literacy, life expectancy and other measures of human development. In addition, sudden oil wealth affords ample opportunity for corrupting the politicians who award contracts to foreign oil firms.

 

 

 

Wishful thinking?

These recent reports are troubling, but is there really any prospect of change? Surprisingly, the answer may be yes. For some time now, Publish What You Pay—a collection of activist groups—has been pestering Big Oil to reveal all the payments it makes to governments, which usually insist that such details be kept secret. Now some big investors are getting in on the act too. On May 19th, ten investment funds managing some $600 billion of assets declared their support for transparency: “This is a significant business risk, making companies vulnerable to accusations of complicity in corrupt behaviour...and possibly compromising their long-term commercial prospects.” Tony Blair has been promoting the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, a scheme that calls for voluntary disclosures. Britain now plans to push for an international approach by raising the topic at the G8 summit in France next weekend and at a ministerial meeting on June 17th.

 

A multilateral approach would certainly be more realistic than any national or unilateral steps. That is what BP discovered when it recently voluntarily revealed the terms of its contracts in Angola. No other oil company followed suit, and the local powers let it be known that they were displeased. A multilateral approach could involve the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which could push countries to publish the details of contracts and to set up resource funds. Some countries howl that such initiatives violate their sovereignty, but that is a smokescreen: rulers with nothing to hide would surely welcome transparency. Others, including Abu Dhabi and Kazakhstan, boast that they already have such funds—but these are weakened by a lack of proper oversight. In contrast, the American proposal for dealing with Iraqi oil revenues could result in the creation of a fund monitored by Kofi Annan.

 

But reform will not be easy. The World Bank recently demanded transparency in return for backing a controversial pipeline running from Chad to Cameroon. After much hesitation, both countries agreed to set up mechanisms that will allow outside monitoring of oil revenues and vowed that the funds will be used only for development purposes. The ink had barely dried on the accord when Chad's ruler was caught diverting oil money to military spending. Getting firms to “publish what you pay is an essential first step,” observed George Soros at the launch of the Open Society book, but the harder step is to get governments to “publish what you receive...and then be accountable for what you receive.”

 

[gHari]

I was thinking it would be nice if we could stop all trade with Islam. Let them see their great society without medicine, technology and science. They don't want us there; then we should let them see what that is really like. Of course, the money-mongers would be difficult to stop making their black-market profits, especially the demon gun-runners. But the problem of our oil-crazy lifestyles may shoot down such a plan.

 

Islam doesn't want us, but they want our stuff. I say to hell with them; turn our back, walk away, good riddance.

 

[krsna]

Globalists and the Creation of the Wahhabi Terrorism

by David Livingstone

 

 

Following the dictates of Hegelian dialectic, the Globalists have created two antagonizing forces, the "Liberal-Democratic" West, against Terrorism, or "political Islam", to force us into the acceptance of their final alternative, a New World Order.

 

The West and Islam have had a long era of compatibility, but this history has been denied to foster the myth of a "Clash of Civilizations". In order to inflame the sentiments of the West against Islam, our attention has been focused on the specter of fanatical Wahhabism, and more specifically, its most notorious exponent, Ossama bin Laden.

 

However, as outlined in an excellent article by Peter Goodgame, "The Globalists and the Islamists" (www.redmoonrising.com/Ikhwan/Clash.htm), that the Globalists have had a hand in shaping and financing all the terrorist organizations of the twentieth century, including the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, the Hamas of Palestine, and the Afghan Mujahideen. But the history of their duplicity dates farther back still, to the eighteenth century, when British Freemason created the Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia itself, to further their imperialistic objectives.

 

That a British spy by the name of Hempher was responsible for shaping of the extreme tenets of Wahhabism was mentioned in a Turkish work,

Mir'at al-Haramain , by Ayyub Sabri Pasha between 1933-1938. British policy in its colonies often involved the creation of deviant sects, in order to Divide and Conquer, as was the case with the Ahmadiyya sect of Islam in India in the nineteenth century.

 

The details of this conspiracy are outlined in a little known document by the name of The Memoirs of Mr. Hempher published in series (episodes) in the German paper Spiegel, and later on in a prominent French paper. A Lebanese doctor translated the document to the Arabic language and from there on it was translated to English and other languages.

 

The document is a first-hand account by Hempher of his mission for his government, who sent him to the Middle East to discover ways to undermine the Ottoman Empire. Among the vices the British were to promote were racism and nationalism, alcohol, gambling, fornication, and tempting Muslim women to uncover themselves.

 

But most important was the strategy to "insert heresies into Muslims' creedal tenets and then criticize Islam for being a religion of terror." To this purpose, Hempher located a particularly corrupt individual by the name of Mohammed Ibn Adbul Wahhab.

 

To understand the brand of fanaticism that Wahhabism inculcated, it is first necessary to recognize that Islam called upon all Muslims, regardless of their race or nationality, to see themselves as brothers in faith. The killing of another Muslim was strictly forbidden.

 

However, as part of their strategy of Divide and Conquer, the British hoped to pit the Arab Muslims against their Turkish brothers. The only way to do so was to find a loophole in Islamic law whereby the Arabs could declare the Turks as apostates.

 

Abdul Wahhab was the instrument by which the British were able to insinuate this vile idea into the Muslims of the Arabian Peninsula. Basically, Wahhab contrived the idea that, simply by the trivial act of offering prayers to saints, that their Turkish brethren had forfeited their faith, and therefore, that it was permitted to kill all who refused to adhere to his reforms, and enslave their women and children. But, that included the entire Muslim world, expect for his small misguided band of followers.

 

But, the Wahabbi movement was insignificant without the allegiance of the Saudi family, who, despite claims otherwise, were descended from a Jewish merchant from Iraq . Orthodox jurists of the time branded the Wahhabis as heretics, and condemned their fanaticism and intolerance. Nevertheless, the Wahhabis then demonstrated their contempt for their pretended faith by indiscriminately slaughtering Muslims and non-Muslims alike. The Wahhabis then set about destroying all the holy tombs and burial grounds. They stole the Prophet's treasure, which included holy books, works of art and innumerable priceless gifts sent to the city during the previous thousand years. The leather and gilt bindings of the Islamic holy books they had destroyed were used to make sandals for the Wahhabi criminals.

 

The Ottoman Sultan brought an end to the first Wahhabi rebellion in 1818, but the sect revived under the leadership of the Saudi Faysal I. The movement was then somewhat restored until once again destroyed at the end of the nineteenth century.

 

After WWI, the former regions of the Ottoman Empire were divided into varying puppets regimes. For aiding to undermine the Ottoman authority in the region, Ibn Saud was duly rewarded with the creation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in 1932. One year later, in 1933, the Saudis granted oil concessions to California Arabian Standard Oil Company (Casoc), affiliate of Standard Oil of California (Socal, today's Chevron), headed by Rothschild agent, and chief among Illuminati families, Rockefeller. Since that time, Saudi Arabia has been the most important ally to the West in the Middle East, not only providing ready access to its plentiful oil reserves, but also in tempering Arab aggression against Israel. Due to the evident hypocrisy of the regime, it has been necessary to suppress the ensuing dissent with brutality. Another important aspect has been preventing scholars from speaking of "politics", that is, to criticize the regime.

 

In The Two Faces of Islam, writes Schwartz, "Their tastes led them to taverns, casinos, brothels. . . . They bought fleets of automobiles, private jets, and yachts the size of warships. They invested in valuable Western art they did not understand or like and which often offended the sensitivities of Wahhabi clerics. They spent as they wished, becoming patrons of international sexual enslavement and the exploitation of children."

 

The result has been that, in order to nonetheless appear to be espousing Islam, the Saudi regime and its puppet scholars have evolved a version of Islam that emphasizes ceremonial details of the religion, at the expense of helping to understand broader political realities. Their manner has encouraged a literal interpretation of Islamic law, permitting the likes of bin Laden to exploit the Koran to justify the killing of innocents.

 

Ultimately, the profusion of Rothschild financed petro-dollars in the coffers of the Saudi family has made it possible to for them to then propagandize their bastardized version of Islam to other parts of the world, most notably to America, where they purportedly subsidize up to 80 percent of the mosques in the country, a version of Islam that substitutes political awareness for dogmatic insistence of ritualistic fanaticism.

 

In 1999, King Fahd of Saudi Arabia attended the Bildeberg meeting, presumably to discuss his role in furthering the interests of world government, along with other such luminaries as Yasser Arafat and the Pope. Evidently, the Saudi family are part of the deceptive ploys of the Illuminati network. Their complicity in the accumulation of petro-dollars has gone into the financing of Global terrorism, from Afghanistan to Bosnia, merely for the purpose of fomenting the necessary animosity of the world against Islam.

 

 

David Livingstone is author of The Dying God: The Hidden History of Western Civilization .

 

 

[krsna]

THE SAUDI DYNASTY: FROM WHERE IS IT? AND WHO IS THE REAL ANCESTOR OF THIS FAMILY?

 

RESEARCH AND PRESENTATION OF: MOHAMMAD SAKHER , who was ordered killed by the Saudi Regime for the following findings:

 

1. Are the Saudi Family members belonging to the Tribe of ANZA BEN WA'EL as they allege to be?

2. Is Islam their actual religion?

3. Are they of an ARAB ORIGIN at all?

 

In the year 851 A.H. a group of men from AL MASALEEKH CLAN, which was a branch of ANZA Tribe, formed a caravan for buying cereals (wheat and corn) and other food stuff from IRAQ, and transporting it back to NAJD. The head of that group was a man called SAHMI BIN HATHLOOL. The caravan reached BASRA, where the members of the group went to a cereal merchant who was a Jew, Called MORDAKHAI BIN IBRAHIM BIN MOSHE'. During their bargaining with that merchant, the Jew asked them : "Where are you from?" They answered: "From ANZA TRIBE; a clan of AL MASALEEKH." Upon hearing that name, the Jew started to hug so affectionately each one of them saying that he, himself, was also from the clan of AL MASALEEKH, but he had come to reside in BASRA (IRAQ) in consequence to a family feud between his father and some members of ANZA Tribe.

 

After he recounted to them his fabricated narrative, he ordered his servants to load all the camels of the clan's members with wheat, dates and tamman; a remarkable deed so generous that astonished the MASALEEKH men and aroused their pride to find such an affectionate (cousin) in IRAQ- the source of their sustenance; they believed each word he said , and , because he was a rich merchant of the food commodities which they were badly in need, they liked him (even though he was a Jew concealed under the garb of an Arab from AL MASALEEKH clan).

 

When the caravan was ready to depart returning to NAJD, that Jewish Merchant asked them to accept his company, because he intended to go with them to his original homeland, NAJD. Upon hearing that from him, they wholeheartedly welcomed him with a very cheerful attitude.

 

So that (concealed) Jew reached NAJD with the caravan. In NAJD, he started to promulgate a lot of propaganda for himself through his companions (his alleged cousins), a fact, which gathered around him a considerable number of new supporters; but, unexpectedly, he confronted a campaign of opposition to his views led by SHEIKH SALEH SALMAN ABDULLA AL TAMIMI, who was a Muslem religious preacher in AL-QASEEM. The radius of his preaching area included Najd, Yemen, and Hijaz, a fact which compelled the Jew (the Ancestor of the present SAUDI FAMILY to depart from AL QASEEM to AL IHSA, where he changed his name (MORDAKHAI) To MARKHAN BIN IBRAHIM MUSA. Then he changed the location of his residence and settled at a place called DIR'IYA near AL-QATEEF, where he started to spread among the inhabitants a fabricated story about the shield of our Prophet MOHAMMAD (p.b.u.h), that it was taken as a booty by an Arab Pagan in consequence of OHOD Battle between the Arab pagans and the Muslems. "That shield, he said, was sold by the Arab Pagan to a Jewish Clan called BANU QUNAIQA' who preserved it as a treasure! He gradually enhanced his position among the Bedouins through such stories which indicated how the Jewish clans in Arabia were so influential and deserved high esteem. He gained some personal importance among the Bedouins, and decided to settle permanently there, at DIR'IYA town, near AL QATEEF, which he decided to be his (Capital) on the Persian Gulf. He aspired to make it his spring board for establishing a Jewish Kingdom in Arabia.

 

 

 

In order to fulfill his ambitious scheme, he started to approach the desert Arab Bedouins for support of his position, them gradually, he declared himself as their king!

 

At that juncture, AJAMAN Tribe together with BANU KHALED Tribe became fully aware of that Jewish cunning plan after they had verified his true identity, and decided to put an end to him. They attacked his town and conquered it, but before arresting him he had escaped by the skin of his teeth.

 

That Jewish Ancestor of the SAUDI FAMILY, (MORDAKHAI), sought shelter in a farm called at that time AL-MALIBEED-GHUSAIBA near AL-ARID, which is called at our present time : AL-RIYADH.

 

He requested the owner of that farm to grant him an asylum. The farmer was so hospitable that he immediately gave him sanctuary. But that Jew (MORDAKHAI), no longer than a month had he stayed there, when he assassinated the land lord and all members of his family, pretending that all were killed by an invading band of thieves. Then he pretended that he had bought that real estate from them before that catastrophe happened to them! Accordingly, he had the right to reside there as a land lord. He then gave a new name to that place: He named it AL-DIRIYA - the same name as that he had lost.

 

That Jewish Ancestor of the SAUDI FAMILY (MORDAKHAI), was quick to establish a "GUEST HOUSE" called "MADAFFA" on the land he usurped from his victims, and gathered around him a group of hypocrites who started to spread out false propaganda for him that he was a prominent Arab Sheikh. He plotted against Sheikh SALEH SALMAN ABDULLA AL TAMIMI, his original enemy, and caused his assassination in the mosque of the town called (AL-ZALAFI).

 

After that, he felt satisfied and safe to make (AL-DIRIYA) his permanent home. There he practiced polygamy at a wide scale, and indeed, he begot a lot of children whom he gave pure Arab names.

 

Eversince his descendants grew up in number and power under the name of SAUDI CLAN, they have followed his steps in practicing under ground activities and conspiracies against the Arab Nation. They illegally seized rural sectors and farm lands, and assassinated every person who tried to oppose their evil plans. They used all kinds of deceit for reaching their goals: they bought the conscience of their dissidents; they offered their women and money to influential people in that area, particularly to those who started to write the true biography of that Jewish Family; they bribed writers of history in order to purify their ignominious history, and make their lineage related to the most prominent Arab Tribes such as RABI'A, ANZA and ALMASALEEKH.

 

A conspicuous hypocrite in our era whose name is MOHAMMAD AMIN AL TAMIMI- Director/Manager of the contemporary Libraries of the SAUDI KINGDOM, made up a genealogical tree (FAMILY TREE) for this JEWISH FAMILY (THE SAUDIS), connecting them to our Great Prophet, MOHAMMAD (P.B.U.H) For his false work, he received a reward of 35 (THIRTY FIVE) THOUSAND EYPTIAN POUNDS from the then SAUDI AMBASSADOR TO CAIRO, EGYPT, in the year 1362 AH.- 1943 A.D. The name of that Ambassador is : IBRAHIM AL-FADEL.

 

As aforementioned, the Jewish Ancestor of the SAUDI FAMILY, (MORDAKHAI), practiced polygamy by marrying a lot of Arab women and begot many children; his polygamous practice is, at the present time, being carried out " to the letter" by his descendants; they cling to his marital heritage!

 

One of MORDAKHAI'S sons called AL-MAQARAN, arabized from the Jewish root (MACK-REN) begot a son called Mohammad, then another son called SAUD, which is the name of the present day SAUDI DYNASTY.

 

Descendants of SAUD (the present day SAUDI FAMILY )started a campaign of assassination of the prominent leaders of the Arab Tribes under the pretence that those leaders were apostates; renegading from the Islamic Religion, and deserting their Koranic doctrines; so they deserved the SAUDI condemnation and slaughter!

 

In the History Book of the SAUDI FAMILY pages (98-101), their private family historian declares that the SAUDI DYNASTY considers all the people of NAJD blasphemous; so their blood must be shed, their properties confiscated, and their females be taken as concubines; no muslem is authentic in his /her belief unless he/she belongs (affiliates) to the sect of MOHAMMAD BIN ABDUL WAHAB, (whose origins are also Jewish from TURKEY.) His doctrines give authority to the SAUDI FAMILY to destroy the villages with all their inhabitants-males including children, and to sexually assault their women; stab the bellies of the pregnant, and cut off the hands of their children, then burn them! They are further authorized by such a BRUTAL DOCTRINE to plunder all the properties of whom they call renegades (not following their Wahabi Sect).

 

 

 

Their hideous Jewish Family has, in fact, done all that kind of atrocities in the name of their false religious sect (the Wahabi), which has actually been invented by a Jew so as to sow the seeds of terror in the hearts of people in towns and villages. This Jewish Dynasty has been committing such brutal atrocities eversince 1163 A.H. They have named the whole Arabian Peninsula after their family name (SAUDI ARABIA) as if the whole region is their own personal real estate, and that all other inhabitants are their mere servants or slaves, toiling day and night for the pleasure of their masters (THE SAUDI FAMILY).

 

They are completely holding the natural wealth of the country as their own property. If any poor person from the common people raises his/her voice complaining against any of the despotic rules of this Jewish Dynasty, (the Dynasty) cuts off his/her head in the public square. A princess of theirs once visited FLORIDA, USA, with her retinue; she rented 90 (NINETY) Suite rooms in a Grand Hotel for about One Million Dollars a night! Can anyone of their subjects comment about that extravagant event If he/she does, his/her fate is quite known: DEATH WITH THE EDGE OF THE SAUDI SWORD IN THE PUBLIC SQUARE!!!!!!

 

 

Witnesses on the Jewish Ancestry of this Saudi Family:

In the 1960's the "SAWT AL ARAB" Broadcasting Station in Cairo, Egypt, and the YEMEN Broadcasting Station in SANA'A confirmed the Jewish Ancestry of the SAUDI Family.

 

King FAISAL AL-SAUD at that time could not deny his family's kindred with the JEWS when he declared to the WASHINGTON POST on Sept. 17, 1969 stating: "WE, THE SAUDI FAMILY, are cousins of the Jews: we entirely disagree with any Arab or Muslem Authority which shows any antagonism to the Jews; but we must live together with them in peace. Our country (ARABIA) is the Fountain head from where the first Jew sprang, and his descendants spread out all over the world." That was the declaration of KING FAISAL AL-SAUD BIN ABDUL AZIZ!!!!!

 

HAFEZ WAHBI, The SAUDI Legal Adviser, mentioned in his book entitled: "THE PENINSULA OF ARABIA" that KING ABDUL AZIZ AL-SAUD, who died in 1953, had said : "Our Message (SAUDI MESSAGE) encountered the opposition of all Arab Tribes; my grandfather, SAUD AWAL, once imprisoned a number of the Sheikhs of MATHEER Tribe; and when another group of the same tribe came to intercede for the release of the prisoners, SAUD AWAL gave orders to his men to cut off the heads of all the prisoners, then, he wanted to humiliate and derogate the interceders by inviting them to eat from a banquet he prepared from the cooked flesh of his victims whose cut off heads he placed on the top of the food platters!! The interceders became so alarmed and declined to eat the flesh of their relatives; and, because of their refusal to eat, he ordered his men to cut off their heads too. That hideous crime was committed by that self imposed king to innocent people whose guilt was their opposition to his most cruel and extremely despotic rules.

 

HAFEZ WAHBI, states further that King ABDUL AZIZ AL-SAUD related that bloody true story to the Sheikhs of the MATHEER Tribe, who visited him in order to intercede for their prominent leader at that time, FAISAL AL DARWEESH, who was the king's prisoner. He related that story to them in order to prevent them from interceding for the release of their Sheikh; otherwise, they would face the same fate; He killed the Sheikh and used his blood as an ablution liquid for him just before he stood up for his prayer (after the false sect doctrine of the Wahabi); The guilt of FAISAL DARWEESH at that time was that he had criticized King ABDUL AZIZ AL-SAUD when the king signed the document which the English Authorities prepared in 1922 as a declaration for giving PALESTINE to the Jews; his signature was obtained in the conference held at AL AQEER in 1922.

 

That was and still is the system of this Regime of the JEWISH FAMILY (SAUDI FAMILY): All its goals are : plundering the wealth of the country, robbing, falsifying, and committing all kinds of atrocity, iniquity, and blasphemy-all are executed in compliance with their self invented Wahabi Sect which legalizes the chopping of the heads of their opposing subjects.

 

[Guest guest]

have they become part of iskcon ?

[AncientMariner]

I agree we should withdraw from Iraq and use the time and resources to develop alternative energy sources. We could bring the military home, train them to be brahmanical warrior priests, and place them on the border. Make it a requirement that to enter America you have to make a solemn vow before God that you will not participate in cow slaughter barring an emergency or you will be instantly vaporized by the localized aspect of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

 

"But there is no clash between the Bible and the Vedas, simply some people formulate their personal ideas and cause quarrelings." (SPL Sivananda, 19 April 1968)

[Guest guest]

far as i know devotees have travelled extensively to saudi states like Sriman Padmapani prabhu and Tribhuvanath, you could check to confirm by visiting the prabhupada connection web site

 

 

[krsna]

<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="416"><tbody><tr><td width="213"></td><td width="203"></td></tr></tbody></table>

<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="629"><tbody><tr><td colspan="3">Is the world's oil running out fast?

 

 

</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="416"><!-- S BO --><!-- S IBYL --><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="416"><tbody><tr><td valign="bottom">By Adam Porter

at the Peak Oil conference in Berlin

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<!-- E IBYL -->

<!-- S IIMA --><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="203"><tbody><tr><td> How long will the oil keep flowing?

</td></tr></tbody></table><!-- E IIMA -->

If you think oil prices are high at $50 a barrel then wait till they are four times that much.

How will you pay to run your car? How will you get the children to school? How will you heat your house? How much will transported food go up in price?

How will we pay for plastics, metals, rubber, cheap flights, Simpson's DVDs, 3G phones and everlasting economic growth?

The basic answer is, we won't.

This is the message from the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO).

The group of oil executives, geologists, investment bankers, academics and others has been warning the world of high oil prices, and the ensuing fallout, for some years now.

The end of cheap oil

It includes a diverse range of oil industry insiders.

People like Ali Bakhtiari, head of strategic planning at Iran's National Oil Company (NOIC), Dr Colin Campbell, a former executive vice president of Total-Fina, and Matthew Simmons, an energy investment banker and adviser to the controversial Bush-Cheney energy plan.

They are united by one idea, that global oil production is about to peak, which in turn will signal the permanent end of cheap oil.

And they warn that this is the foundation of the current rise in oil prices.

Who hurts when prices explode?

"Oil is far too cheap at the moment," says Mr Simmons.

"The figure I'd use is around $182 a barrel. We need to price oil realistically to control its demand. That is because global production is peaking."

<!-- S IIMA --><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="203"><tbody><tr><td> Large new oil fields are ever more difficult to find

</td></tr></tbody></table><!-- E IIMA -->"If we price oil correctly," Mr Simmons says, "it could give us time to find bridge fuels, fuels to fill the gap between an oil economy and a renewable economy. But I don't see that happening."

The adherents of the peak oil theory warn the decline of world oil output will force oil prices higher for good, and that the knock on effects could be catastrophic.

"In my opinion, unfortunately, there will be no linear change," says Iran's Ali Bakhtiari. "There will only be sudden explosive change."

"The people who will be least affected will be the super poor, who already have no access to energy, and the super rich who do not care if oil is $100 a barrel."

"It is everyone who is in the middle who will be hurt the most," says Mr Bakhtiari. "When the crisis comes there will be enormous changes."

Oil rationing?

<!-- S IIMA --><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="203"><tbody><tr><td> Dr Campbell says endless growth is not possible

</td></tr></tbody></table><!-- E IIMA -->

Much of ASPO's predictions stem from the calculations of Dr Campbell.

His work on oil reserves has long suggested that many official oil data are either flawed estimates or at worst downright lies.

Scandals like the 23% of 'lost' reserves at Royal Dutch Shell have helped to boost interest in his work.

False reserves threaten the security of energy supply, just as do bombs under pipelines.

Dr Campbell's conclusion: oil production and consumption should be regulated by governments.

"Many reserve figures are highly questionable," says Dr Campbell.

"Many great oil fields are increasingly old and inefficient. But I don't think oil is easy to produce with a sniper behind every palm tree."

"The way to increase energy security is to reduce demand," he says.

'Difficult times'

At ASPO's recent conference in Berlin, companies such as BP and Exxon and men such as Fatih Birol, chief economist of the International Energy Agency, began to talk to the proponents of the peak oil theory.

Whilst they may not agree with Dr Campbell's theories, their attendance highlighted ASPO's emerging importance in the oil debate.

In public, Mr Birol denied that supply would not be able to meet rising demand, especially from the buoyant economies in the USA, China and India.

But after his speech he seemed to change his tune.

"For the time being there is no spare capacity. But we expect demand to increase by the fourth quarter (of the year) by three million barrels a day."

He pinned his hopes for an increase in production squarely on troubled Saudi Arabia.

"If Saudi does not increase supply by 3 million barrels a day by the end of the year we will face, how can I say this, it will be very difficult. We will have difficult times. They must invest."

Can Saudi deliver?

But even Mr Birol admitted that Saudi production was "about flat".

Three million extra barrels a day would mean a huge 30% leap in output in just a few months.

<!-- S IIMA --><table align="right" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="203"><tbody><tr><td> North Sea oil production is in decline

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When BBC News Online followed up by asking if this giant increase in production was actually possible rather than simply a desire he refused to answer. "You are from the press? This is not for you. This is not for the press."

Asking other delegates - admittedly supporters of the peak oil theory - whether such a steep increase was feasible, the answers were unambiguous: "absolutely out of the question,completely impossible," and "3 million barrels - never, not even 300,000."

One delegate laughed so hard he had to support himself on a table.

Some recent figures tend to back up ASPO's outlook.

North Sea production is declining at an increasing rate, having peaked in 1999.

Not at the predicted flat rate of decline of 7%, but gradually accelerating from 7% to 8.5% to 11%.

And the number of major new oil fields discovered around the world fell to zero for the first time in 2003, despite an obvious increase in technological expertise.

"We need transparency with the figures," says Dr Campbell.

"This avoids profiteering from shortages, the collapse of poor countries and it will stimulate alternatives."

"Consumer countries need to be able to audit fields, but at the same time 'flat earth' economists who believe in endless growth need to change their ideas." And Dr Campbell has a dire warning: "If the real figures were to come out there would be panic on the stock markets, in the end that would suit no one."

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