PARIS, Nov 7: The International Energy Agency warned on Monday that the entire world would suffer if a handful of oil-rich countries in the Middle East and North Africa did not invest sufficiently in energy production over the next 25 years.

The IEA, in its World Energy Outlook report for 2005, predicted that under its “reference scenario”, gas production in the region would triple by 2030 while that of oil would grow by 75 per cent.

The report focused on six of the largest-energy producing states in the Middle East — Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emriates — as well as North African producers Algeria, Egypt and Libya.

By 2030, according to the IEA, these countries will be responsible for 44pct of world oil production against 35pc at present.

But experts at the IEA, which seeks to coordinate and monitor energy policies in its 26 member states, foresee two other scenarios that could also unfold over the next quarter century.

Under the first projection, the target countries — instead of boosting investment — could in fact decide to defer such spending.

The IEA said a doubling in annual upstream investment would be needed by 2030 but cautioned: “It is far from certain that all that investment will be forthcoming.”

It suggested that some Middle East and North African producers “could choose deliberately to develop production capacity more slowly” than the IEA foresees or could be hamstrung by external factors such as a shortage of capital.

Under such circumstances, it said, the global energy balance would be “radically altered.”

The report calculated that if upstream investment in oil producing facilities were to remain constant in the target countries at an average share of gross domestic product over the past decade, the resulting decline in investment would come to $110 billion between now and 2030.

That would act as a drag on world economic growth, lowering global energy demand by six per cent in 2030 compared to the reference scenario.

The IEA added that the producers themselves would suffer in the absence of robust investment, since many of them are heavily dependent on revenues from crude oil sales.

Under a third, “alternative” course of events, according to the IEA, consuming countries would press ahead with “vigorous new policy measures” aimed at rationalizing energy use and switching from fossil fuels.

Such policies “could and no doubt will steer the world onto a different energy path,” the IEA said, citing a call by Group of Eight at a July summit for measures to combat consumption of fossil fuels and greenhouse-gas emissions.

Stronger action on conservation would mean a fall in oil and gas demand in the main consuming regions, leading to reduced Middle East and North African exports and lower prices, according to the IEA.—AFP