ISLAMABAD: The oil import bill grew a paltry 1.35 per cent in the first seven months of the current fiscal year to $9.46 billion from $9.33bn over the corresponding period last year, showed data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) on Monday.

The data analysis suggests that all the groups, including petroleum goods, consumer durables and raw materials, have witnessed a growth in imports during the July-January 2024-25.

The overall import bill posted a growth of 7.08pc year-on-year to $33.08bn in July-January, mainly due to an increase in the arrival of raw materials, textile products, agriculture products, machinery and automobile sectors.

Product-wise data showed the largest increase from crude oil, up 4.98pc in 7MFY25 from a year ago. However, the total quantity of petroleum crude rose 18.20pc to 5.78 million tonnes from 4.89m tonnes last year.

The value of petroleum products imports dipped 3.69pc 7MFY25 from a year ago, whereas a 10.72pc increase was recorded in terms of the total quantity imported, bringing the total up to 6.15m tonnes from 5.55m tonnes.

On the other hand, liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports decreased 4.17pc while the import of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) surged 47.54pc during the period under review.

Machinery imports were up 16.17pc to $5.06bn from $4.35bn in 7MFY24 due to a surge in textile machinery-related imports, construction and electrical machinery. The import of textile machinery was up by 60.36pc, electrical machinery and apparatus by 27.13pc and construction machinery posted a growth of 54pc.

The imports of the telecommunication group declined by 4.18pc year-on-year mainly due to the decline in imports of mobile phones during the months under review.

The import of mobile handsets declined by 12.04pc during the first seven months of the current fiscal year, mainly due to increased tax rates. The overall transport group also witnessed a positive growth of 20.96pc during the first seven months of the current fiscal year from a year ago. The transport sector’s growth was contributed by CKD/SKD and CBU vehicles.

In the agriculture sector, the import of fertilizers saw a negative growth of 7.08pc in the first seven months of the current fiscal year from a year ago, followed by insecticides at 26.69pc.

However, the import of plastic material recorded a growth of 7.61pc and medicinal products 15.23pc during the months under review. The import of metal grew at 7.44pc during July-January mainly due to the import of iron and steel scrap.

Published in Dawn, February 18th, 2025