RUSSIA - Nov. 9 - Moscow To Make Voluntary Oil Output Cuts.

PM Mikhail Kasyanov says six or seven of the top oil companies are set to propose voluntary cuts in oil export volumes which the government will "support and possibly even correct". The move is aimed at helping reverse the recent global fall in oil prices. He says Russian oil should trade at $20-25/b, and warns that if it falls beneath $18/b the government's efforts to service its foreign debt in 2003 will be hampered. But he stresses that such a drop would not be "catastrophic". (On Nov. 12, ministers from leading oil exporting countries are to hold talks in Moscow, before a meeting of OPEC on Nov. 14. The cartel is to discuss output cuts of 1.5m b/d and would like non-members including Russia to reduce output by a further 500,000 b/d. Saudi Oil Minister Ali Naimi is due to meet Russian officials alongside his counterparts from Algeria - Chakib Khelil, who is the president of OPEC - as well as Venezuela and Iran). Kasyanov's remarks were greeted with scepticism by the Russian oil companies. One industry insider said the comments were "more about politics than economics" and that Russian technological, climatic and oil quality conditions made it difficult to stockpile reserves. Another argued that Kasyanov's statements were no more than "lip service", and added in a reference to the price rises triggered by OPEC cuts that "it makes sense for Russia to freeload for as long as it can". (Output cuts by Russian producers have proved difficult to verify in the past. Mexico, Oman, Russia and Norway agreed to slight production cuts in 1998, when prices sank below $10b, but only Mexico made any real effort to curb supply). The government's gesture would swell government revenues and oil company profits, while lending support to Middle Eastern exporters. But it risks damaging its relations with the US, which would suffer from price rises, ahead of a bilateral summit next week.