Inadequate investment in the oil and gas sector is the chief reason behind the recent spike in prices and OPEC is not to blame, OPEC Secretary-General Haitham Al Ghais told CNBC on Wednesday.

"There are other factors beyond OPEC that are really behind the spike we have seen in gas (and) in oil. And again, I think in a nutshell, for me, it is underinvestment — chronic underinvestment,” he told CNBC. 

“OPEC is not behind this price increase.”

(Reporting by Jyoti Narayan in Bengaluru; Editing by Edmund Blair)