KARACHI: The country’s oil sales in the first quarter of the ongoing fiscal year (1QFY22) posted a 24 per cent growth to 5.863 million tonnes from 4.743m tonnes on the back of rising trend in sales of furnace oil (FO), high speed diesel (HSD), petrol, HOBC and light diesel oil.

Sale of FO grew by 38pc to 1.273m tonnes from 923,000 tonnes followed by rise in HSD sales to 2.099m tonnes from 1.653m tonnes and 2.350m tonnes in petrol sales from 2.057m tonnes in1QFY20.

Oil sales in September 2021 clocked in at 1.962m tonnes from 1.525m tonnes in the same month in 2020 owing mainly to 51pc jump in HSD sales to 707,000 tonnes from 469,000 tonnes in same month 2020. Petrol sales soared to 805,000 tonnes from 642,000 tonnes.

Shahrukh Saleem, CFA at AKD Securities Limited, said FO sales had risen due to increased share of furnace oil-based power production in the mix after coal while LNG prices globally have increased substantially due to global energy crunch. Rising sales of HSD and petrol signalled improving economic activities.

He expected sales volumes to tread the same path with economic activity picking up pace while incentives provided by the government in FY22 Budget to the agriculture sector along with focus on infrastructure spending can provide a significant uplift to volumes in medium term. He was of the view that petrol and HSD sales are expected to post a growth of 10pc and 9pc for FY22.

Besides, increasing sales of automobiles like cars, SUVs, jeeps, pickups, heavy vehicles, two- and three-wheelers have been creating additional demand for petrol and diesel. Closure of CNG pumps and rising prices of CNG and LPG had also shifted a number of consumers towards petrol. This is despite the fact that petrol prices have also been crawling up.

Published in Dawn, October 6th, 2021