By EuAsiaNews
Brussels: The European Union’s topmost energy official invited Friday emerging economies, in particular China and India, to join collective international efforts to deal with high oil prices and boost energy efficiency.
EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs made the call at a meeting attended by U.S. Energy Secretary Sam Bodman, Japan’s Trade Minister Akira Amari and Nobuo Tanaka, head of the International Energy Agency, held at the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort of Davos Friday.
European Commission’s energy spokesman Ferran Tarradellas Espuny told a news conference in Brussels that the forthcoming meeting of G8 plus China , India and Korea energy ministers in Japan in June “will be a good opportunity for working for concrete actions to this end.”
He said Piebalgs did not attend the Davos meeting in person but spoke to the participants by phone.
The EU Commissioner expressed serious concerns about the rise in oil prices which can result in a slowing of global economic growth and damage the economies of developed, developing and oil producing countries as a whole.
There are short term reasons for the high oil prices including inventory levels, geopolitical tensions, winter demands and flow of investment money, the spokesman quoted Piebalgs as saying.
The Commissioner believes that there are longer term issues “like the concentration of demand in the transport sector and the growing importance of the developing economies in oil demand growth,” he added.