Norway's Statoil to cut up to 1500 more jobs

Statoil, grappling with plunging global oil prices, plans to cut between 1,100 and 1,500 jobs, or seven percent of its workforce, by the end of 2016, the Norwegian oil giant said Tuesday.

The company, which is 67 percent state-owned, carried out an 8.0 percent cut in staff levels last year to 22,500.

The company will also dismiss 525 external consultants, it said in a statement.

"We regret the need for further reductions, but the improvements are necessary to strengthen Statoil’s competitiveness and secure our future value creation," chief operating officer Anders Opedal said in the statement.

The cuts are part of a programme to generate $1.7 billion in annual savings from 2016 that Statoil announced last year when oil prices were still above $100 per barrel.

Oil prices have since fallen to under $50 per barrel before recovering to around $60, pushing energy companies to accelerate cost-cutting measures and suspend or scale back investment.

In February, when it announced annual profits had been slashed in half due to tumbling oil prices and heavy write-downs, Statoil also announced a 10 percent cut in its $20 billion investment budget for this year.

Statoil, which went into the red in the second half of the year, also warned in February of further staff reductions.