Major oil consuming nations and companies must outline their plans for the downstream refining sector to help avoid wild oil price swings, Nigerian Minister of State for Petroleum Edmund Daukoru said on Sunday.
Concern over shortages of refined oil products, particularly of gasoline in the United States, have been a major factor in the oil price rally that has taken crude prices to record highs over $75 a barrel.
Attacks on Nigeria's oil industry, concern over Iranian supply and turmoil in Iraq have also pushed prices sharply higher.
"It's ridiculous that every small event, or incident - whether natural or man made - results in a price that swings," Daukoru said. "We have to do something."
"We all know where the main bottlenecks are in the downstream," said Daukoru, also president of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.
"In the upstream we are doing our best but the downstream bottlenecks are not going to go away over night."
With OPEC already pumping as much oil as its customers can take, there is little the group can do to tame prices that are at their highest level in real terms for a quarter of a century.
OPEC ministers have been keen to point out that consuming nations also need to address a shortage of refining capacity.
Consuming governments need to say how much capacity they can bring on in the next 10 years, Daukoru said.
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