"Let us see what is the point of view of the brothers...but there must be seriousness on this issue," Kuwait oil minister Sheikh Saud Nasser al-Sabah said before flying to South Africa where he will meet Opec and non-Opec counterparts.

When asked if producers had any other option but a third round of cuts to achieve the target price of $17 for a barrel of benchmark Brent, the hawkish minister said:

"We tried cuts and the price is still low... let us see what other options the brothers might have."

Sheikh Saud told Reuters on Tuesday that world markets were still oversupplied and vowed to support a third round of cuts.

"The bottom line of this whole thing is that there is too much oil in the market... If it takes a cut in production to improve prices, we are for it.

"Cutting production should not be limited to Opec members only.Non-Opec (members) should also comply and cooperate with any decision taken by us," he added.

The Kuwaiti minister, whose country currently has an Opec quota of 1.98 million barrels per day (bpd), has repeatedly said that for Kuwait it was a matter of price and not output volume.

Brent at around $13 a barrel is some $6 below last year's average, a situation dominating the build-up to this week's Cape Town informal gathering of ministers from about 50 major oil producing and consuming nations.

Sheikh Saud said on Tuesday: "It is not just our target. It is the target of every member of Opec. When we decided to cut (production) last June our expectation were that (by November) crude would reach $17 provided every body (complied with pledged) cuts.

"This is something shared by everyone and this was the target and the reason for the cuts," he added. "The prices today are absolutely unacceptable to everyone."

But prices dropped further on Tuesday as traders concluded that the talks between Opec andnon-Opec states offered little prospect of more output cuts.

Earlier this month, Kuwait warned other oil exporters of a production war if they failed to comply with already pledged cuts, adding that Gulf Arab allies could flood the market.

Kuwait, which controls just under 10 percent of proven world oil reserves, has so far this year cut its production by 225,000 bpd as part of two collective accords to reduce supply to world markets by 3.1 million bpd.