IEA Member Countries to Carry Out Largest Ever Oil Stock Release Amid Market Disruptions from Middle East Conflict
March 31, 2026
IEA Member Countries to Carry Out Largest Ever Oil Stock Release
The 32 Member countries of the International Energy Agency (IEA) unanimously agreed on March 11, 2026, to make 400 million barrels of oil from their emergency reserves available to the market to address disruptions in oil markets stemming from the war in the Middle East.
The decision to take emergency collective action was made following an extraordinary meeting of IEA Member governments yesterday, convened by the IEA Executive Director to assess market conditions amid the conflict in the Middle East and consider the options to address supply disruptions.
“The oil market challenges we are facing are unprecedented in scale, therefore I am very glad that IEA Member countries have responded with an emergency collective action of unprecedented size,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. “Oil markets are global so the response to major disruptions needs to be global too. Energy security is the founding mandate of the IEA, and I am pleased that IEA Members are showing strong solidarity in taking decisive action together.”
The emergency stocks will be made available to the market over a timeframe that is appropriate to the national circumstances of each Member country and will be supplemented by additional emergency measures by some countries.
IEA members hold emergency stockpiles of over 1.2 billion barrels, with a further 600 million barrels of industry stocks held under government obligation. The coordinated stock release is the sixth in the history of the IEA, which was created in 1974. Previous collective actions were taken in 1991, 2005, 2011, and twice in 2022.
The conflict in the Middle East that began on 28 February 2026 has impeded oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz, with export volumes of crude and refined products currently at less than 10% of pre-conflict levels. This is forcing operators across the region to shut in or curtail a substantial amount of production.
An average of 20 million barrels per day of crude oil and oil products transited the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, or around 25% of the world’s seaborne oil trade. Options for oil flows to bypass the Strait of Hormuz are limited.
The International Energy Agency Secretariat will provide further details of how this collective action will be implemented in due course. It will also continue to closely monitor global oil and gas markets and to provide recommendations to Member governments, as needed.
International Energy Agency Executive Director Dr Fatih Birol delivering his statement on the situation in global energy markets
