The sharp decline in global oil prices has come as a big challenge for the petrochemical industry with the dramatic fall sliding to a new four-year low and widely being seen as the biggest shift for the oil producing countries since the recession period, the global financial crisis five years ago.

Oil prices have collapsed to four-year lows on factors including dampening demand in a sluggish world economy, a sharp rise in output from shale oil and other unconventional sources, and a strong dollar.

A barrel of crude has plunged in value from above $100 earlier this year to around $80.

The surprising decline reached the four-year low at $78 per barrel last week with speculators looking ahead to a possible cut in production by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in the wake of the sharp decline in oil prices.

The pressure on OPEC members to cut crude oil production is growing due to increasing US crude oil production and supplies, which has contributed majorly in sending world oil prices sliding to a new four-year low.

Keeping the focus intact on the oil market, oil exporting countries look upon their OPEC partners if they will get over their differences to cut production to shore up prices and perhaps halt further slide.

OPEC ministers meet in Vienna, Austria, on Thursday.

Saudi Arabia has however hinted that it does not want to go it alone with a production cut as the falling oil price is not a big threat to the Arabian Gulf.

Instead the Middle East countries including the Kingdom are adjusting their official selling price to maintain the market share, particularly in Asian countries, the major oil importing countries from the Arabian Gulf.

Moreover, the Gulf countries have huge financial reserves that they have built since years support their sustainability and they are likely to cope comfortably with price cut rather than production cut to combat cheaper oil supply.

Their huge savings and low debt levels support the argument that their fiscal policy need not to be tightened in the Arabian Gulf.

Commenting on the dramatic fall of oil prices, Finance Minister Ibrahim Al-Assaf recently asserted that the Kingdom will continue to show strong economic growth despite the fall in oil prices.

He attributed his prediction to the huge government expenditure on major infrastructure projects across the Kingdom, but added that the decrease in oil prices would affect the fiscal income.

He also pointed out that the Kingdom has the tools and potentials to deal with such sharp decline in oil prices.

“Saudi Arabia has been able to build huge reserves over the past years as a result of its fiscal policy and by reducing public debt to nearly zero,” Al-Assaf maintained.

The minister also underlined the need for raising the level of cooperation in the energy sector and designing an action plan to raise energy efficiency.

However, the dramatic fall in the petroleum prices have caused worry in the countries where petrochemical industry provides the mainstay to the economy as this new trend in oil markets could affect the social stability especially in African countries due to dependency on crude oil exported to global markets.

Some oil producing countries, instead of quickly devising ingenious plans against the threatening event, may continue to search around measures that could keep them afloat within the crisis period.

Notably, Nigeria in October warned that a sustained drop in the price of crude oil would force the federal government to adopt painful cost-cutting measures to save the economy, saying the lower oil prices would provide a stronger incentive to government to move strongly against oil theft, which has cost the country billions of dollars annually, as well as drive through stalled oil sector legislation to stimulate production.

Significantly, the oil prices have declined by nearly 30 percent since peaking in June 2014.

Brent crude, which serves as the major benchmark price for purchases of oil worldwide, also crashed considerably below $80 in early November.

Moreover, according to the latest reports by the International Energy Agency (IEA) this sudden fall in oil prices will affect the petrochemical sector badly with potential to upset the social stability of some countries especially

in African countries whose major economic mainstay is crude oil exported to global market spots.

However, it asserts that the weak crude oil demand, strong dollar and booming oil production

in the US could mean a new chapter in the history of the oil markets.

The report assumes significance as it comes just ahead of the 166th general meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which is slated for Nov 27, 2014 in Vienna, Austria.

A recent monthly oil market report of OPEC underlined that in October, OPEC crude oil production averaged 30.25 million barrels per day.

UAE Oil Minister Suhail Al-Mazrouei, meanwhile, said that the current slide in oil prices will “not be catastrophic” for his oil-rich country, thanks to economic diversification.

OPEC will “deal appropriately with the current drop” when it meets in Vienna, he said in Abu Dhabi.

Al-Mazrouei said that the fall in prices is “not new,” adding that oil revenues contribute only 30 percent of the UAE’s gross domestic product.

The UAE pumps around 2.8 million barrels of crude per day, the third highest amount among OPEC producers.