Iran scales down oil revenue forecasts

The Iranian parliament has agreed to cut the forecast from oil revenues for the next financial year by 7.5% because of the recent slide in crude prices.

The government's budget had anticipated earnings of $14.9 billion from crude oil exports, based on a price of $17.5 a barrel.

But the parliament set the price at $16 per barrel, although Iranian crude is currently trading at three to four dollars below that level.

"The prices and the production ceiling forecast in the government's budget are not realistic and will be difficult to achieve," MP Mohassen Yahyavi, a former oil minister, told parliament.

Iran's next financial year runs from March 1998.