Oil prices are falling. Economists are cutting forecasts for global economic growth. Oil giants are reporting lower profits.

But on Saturday, eight countries that belong to the oil cartel known as OPEC Plus said they would add about 411,000 barrels of oil a day in June. The move, which follows a similar step by the group to increase oil production at their April meeting, is a major shift in policy that will ripple through the wider energy industry, hitting profits of oil companies and forcing cutbacks.

The group said in a statement that the market was “healthy” and noted that oil inventories remained low.

Saudi Arabia, the de facto leader of OPEC Plus, is signaling that it is reluctant to hold back millions of barrels a day of oil that it could produce, especially when other members of the group, like Kazakhstan and Iraq, are not observing their agreed-upon production ceilings.

“The view from Saudi Arabia, in particular, is that they no longer want to be the ones carrying the heaviest burden if other countries in the group are not showing sufficient commitment to doing their part,” said Richard Bronze, the head of geopolitics at Energy Aspects, a London research firm.

Demand for oil has not weakened significantly. Oil consumption increased by 1.2 million barrels a day in the first quarter of 2025, the most since 2023, according to the International Energy Agency in Paris. Analysts there and elsewhere, though, are cutting their forecasts for demand in anticipation of disruption from global trade tensions, which has already slammed prices.