ISLAMABAD, May 22: Pakistan will be paying $1.1bn (little over Rs65bn) extra on import of furnace oil in the current fiscal year mainly because of electricity shortage and the burden will grow in coming years.

A senior petroleum ministry official said the government had estimated furnace oil consumption at 650,000 tons for power generation but the electricity shortages had compelled to import an estimated 4.4 million tons, or about six times higher than the estimated.

As such, the government had anticipated furnace oil imports at $235 million for the current fiscal year, which has now expected to go up to $1.335 billion, about five times higher foreign exchange payments.

But this higher burden was partially offset by significant reduction in the diesel, aviation fuel and crude oil imports. The diesel and crude oil imports cost the national exchequer $828 million lower than anticipated by the government.

As result, net loss in oil imports during the current year is expected to be about $270 million. The government had allocated a total of $7.23 billion for total oil imports for the current year, which has now been estimated at $7.5 billion.

The official said the government had projected total crude oil imports at 73.3 million tons for the current year at a cost of $4.545 billion but the overall imports were now updated to remain 17 per cent lower at 62.5 million tons at a cost of $3.87 billion, providing a saving of $674 million.

The official said that the government had forecast import of four million tons of diesel for the current year but the actual consumption was expected at about 3.4 million tons. As a result, the diesel import bill would be just $2.3 billion against budgeted estimates of $2.45 billion, leaving a saving of about $150 million.

Informed sources said the furnace oil imports would cost even higher ($1.36bn) than $1.335 billion this year mainly because of an expected 10 per cent increase in international fuel prices.

Pakistan’s next year oil import bill has now been estimated to cross $8.8 billion mainly because of an expected 8.5 per cent increase in international prices.