ABU DHABI — Kuwait has pledged to increase crude oil production by 300,000 barrels in 2009.

Kuwait said it would use its spare capacity to bolster oil output by 300,000 barrels per day starting from mid-2009, Middle East Newsline reported.

The sheikdom, which plans to spend $55 billion on oil production through 2013, has been producing 2.58 million barrels of oil per day.

On June 24, the official Kuwait News Agency quoted Oil Minister Mohammed Al Olaim as saying "Kuwait is capable of increasing its oil output, but wondered if the market needed that increase."

Two days earlier, Al Olaim said Kuwait had not decided on any increase in production.

Kuwait intends to increase oil production to four million barrels per day by 2020. The sheikdom has sought to launch "Project Kuwait," meant to pump at least 700,000 barrels of oil per day from fields near the Iraqi border.

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