Ministers from the 11 member states will hold a formal meeting on Wednesday.

The average price per barrel of oil slumped in the third quarter of this year to $12.33, compared with $18.03 in the third quarter of 1997.

The slump could hit OPEC countries' economies as they are mostly dependent on oil revenues for government financing.

Will member countries be able to agree new measures?

Production cuts agreed at a meeting in June were designed to boost flagging prices.

But some member countries are seen as not complying fully with the agreement and there are likely to be calls at the meeting for them to do so.

In its latest report in October, the International Energy Agency recorded 93% compliance with the agreement, excluding Iraq which is subject to United Nations sanctions.

However, analysts believe compliance by Iran, Indonesia and Venezuela is lower than this.

Venezuela stands accused of increasing output for domestic political reasons ahead of December presidential elections.

There are also growing concerns that Iran is wavering on its promise to reduce supplies as it has said it was asked to cut from too low a baseline.

Call for summit

The crisis has prompted Algerian President Liamine Zeroual to call for a rare heads of state summit, possibly early next year.

The idea has been backed by the United Arab Emirates.

Algeria is also backing Kuwait's call for further cuts to the 2.6m barrels a day agreed in June, saying prices have reached "dangerously low levels".

OPEC produces around 26.9m barrels of oil a day.

New moves unlikely

The chance of any new action to tackle the problem looks negligible.

Saudi Arabia, OPEC's leading policy maker, has ruled out more output curbs, insisting it wants full adherence to existing limits.

Riyadh is concerned that it should not be left to shoulder the burden of supply restraint leaving rivals to grab market share - a situation it vowed never to repeat after the last big oil slump in 1986.

Ministers are expected to consider only prolonging current measures by six months to the end of next year.