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Brazil's state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro (Petrobras) S.A. has said that production at its 11 refineries has been maintained despite striking oil workers staying off the job for a second successive day yesterday.

Approximately two-thirds of Petrobras production workers stopped work on Monday in protest against safety conditions, pay, profit sharing agreements and recent layoffs.

According to Marluzio Ferreira Dantas, spokesman for the National Oil Workers Federation, production at a Petrobras refinery in the Amazon jungle city of Manaus was halted due to the strike. The facility, one of the company's smallest refineries, produces approximately 46,000 barrels of oil per day.

Petrobras said yesterday that production had been maintained at the company’s refineries and platforms, including in the Campos Basin (Rio de Janeiro), which accounts for 85% of the oil Petrobras produces in Brazil.

"The company’s terminals are operating normally, production is being offloaded and products delivered as usual," Petrobras said in a statement.

"Derivatives production was not affected at the refineries. A few of them have joined the strike partially and are being operated by their own teams or by contingency teams. The four industrial units (including the Schist Production Unit and the Fertilizer and Lubricant Plants) also continue operating normally," the company added.

According to Dantas, however, oil production has been affected by the strike. "Petrobras may say what it likes, but I can assure you operations have come to a halt in some units and slowed down in others," Dantas said.

Petrobras and the labor unions held a meeting yesterday to negotiate the workers’ demands, in the presence of the Single Oil Workers’ Federation (FUP) and of the other unions.

Petrobras presented a new PPR proposal and other issues that compose the labor unions’ agenda were also discussed.

"Negotiations will be retaken tomorrow morning, and the expectation is that the strike will be terminated," Petrobras said.