Thursday, January 6 2005 10:52 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: India today (Jan 6, 2005) called for developing an Asian oil market and putting in place longer supply contracts to provide stability and security of supplies to major consuming countries.

"For us in Asia to convert underlying stability in production into stability in oil market, it is essential that we develop a sophisticated Asian market for petroleum and petroleum products," Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said at the Roundtable for Asian Ministers on Regional Cooperation in oil economies in Delhi.

Aiyar said that greater stability in Asian trade could be there when "long term contracts become longer, price discovery through the market is more transparent and spot purchases occupy a progressively larger share of market transactions."