June 07, 2008	Saturday	Jamadi-us-Sani 02, 1429

KARACHI, June 6: After a gap of five months, the Pakistan State Oil has sought to import petrol for the June-July period.

An official, on condition of anonymity, told Dawn that the PSO would issue a tender on Saturday for the import of Mogas MS-87 RON for supply of 20,000 tons (firm) for the period of June 25-27 while another 20,000 tons (optional) for the period of July to August.

According to figures of Oil Companies Advisory Committee (OCAC), the country had already imported 113,025 tons of petrol during October to December 2007 to meet the demand.

A refinery operator said that the demand and supply gap for petrol had widened owing to rising consumption of motor spirit in power generators and motorcycles after suspension in arrival of smuggled Irani petrol.

He said that refineries produced 115,000-120,000 tons of petrol per month, but the demand stands above 125,000 tons hence the deficit is being imported.

He added that the presence of smuggled Iranian petrol had been very negligible since the Iranian government had introduced rationing system last year.

Contrary to this, figures compiled by Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS) revealed import of 58,419 tons of petrol from five countries at a cost Rs5.85 billion during July-February 2007-2008 in which highest imports were recorded from Sudan at 35,289 tons (Rs1.96 billion) followed by 19,148 tons (Rs3.6 billion) from the UAE, 1,975 tons (Rs111 million) from the Netherlands, 1,426 tons (Rs64 million) from Singapore and 581 tons (Rs23 million) from Kuwait.

Power generator imports during July-April 2007-08 went up by 38 per cent to $852 million from $616 million in the same period last year.

Karachi Generator Importers’ Group (KGIG) president Sikandar Shahzada said that out of total imports, the share of petrol generators’ was 70 per cent followed by diesel (20 per cent) and gas generators (10 per cent).

He said that there might be a slight increase in petrol demand from 10 per cent users of petrol generators as 90 per cent of such generators were running on gas.The sale of petrol during July-April 2007-08 went up by 30 per cent to 1.21 million tons as compared to 0.935 million tons in the same period of last fiscal. Similarly, high speed diesel (HSD) sales surged by 14 per cent to 6.7 million tons from 5.86 million tons in the corresponding period last year.

The country had also been exporting petrol recently owing to what refineries and oil marketing companies (OMCs) described as the surplus availability of petrol.