ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s food and oil import bill rose 5.5 per cent year-on-year to $6.415 billion in the first five months of the current fiscal year despite a decline in global prices of crude and grains.

The share of these products stood at 33pc of Pakistan’s total import bill during the July-November period, putting more pressure on the country’s balance of payments.

The country’s trade deficit is widening as the overall import bill of the country is also on the rise since the start of the current fiscal year.

Official figures compiled by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics show that petroleum imports increased 5.4pc year-on-year to $4.075bn in July-November.

A breakdown shows that imports of petroleum products went up by 11pc to $2.603bn in the five-month period. However, a decline of 23pc was recorded in the import bill of petroleum crude.

In the petroleum group, the import bill of natural gas liquefied surged by 112pc to $424.615m in July-November. At the same time, a growth of 36.7pc was recorded in the import of petroleum gas liquefied during the period under review.

Reduction in the oil import bill in the period under review followed a steep increase in the imports of petroleum products, which indicates that domestic refineries are not operating at full capacity.

The second-biggest component in the import bill was food commodities, whose exports rose 5.4pc year-on-year to $2.34bn in the first five months of the current fiscal year.

This increase has been attributed to massive imports of ‘other’ food items worth $888.691 million, followed by $670.563m of palm oil and $288.607m of pulses. Imports of dry fruits and milk products also grew during the period under review.

The import bill of machinery also surged 43pc to $4.631bn, mainly driven by power generating machinery, followed by office, textile, construction and electrical machinery.

However, a negative growth was witnessed in the import bill of the telecom sector, mainly because of increase in the duty on its import of mobile phone and other apparatus.

Published in Dawn, December 22nd, 2016