Qatar is a member of the Organization of the Oil Exporting Countries? or OPEC and is a significant oil producer according to the US Energy Information Administration.

The Qatari government has devoted more resources recently to the development of natural gas, particularly for export as liquefied natural gas (LNG). Though only producing LNG since 1997, Qatar is now the world’s largest supplier of LNG. Qatar is also a member and host country for the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF), an organization formed in 2001 to promote the interest of the world’s major gas producers.

According to Oil & Gas Journal?, as of January 1, 2011, Qatar has 25.4 billion barrels of proven oil reserves. Qatar was the sixteenth largest crude oil exporter in the world in 2009, and of the 12 OPEC members, ranked eleventh in crude oil exports.The onshore Dukhan field?, located along the west coast of the peninsula, is the country’s oldest producing oil field, though it has been surpassed in production volumes by the offshore Al-Shaheen field?, which averaged about 300,000bbl/d in 2009.