ISLAMABAD, Oct 27: The country’s import bill of petroleum crude increased by 5.34 per cent during the first quarter (July-September) period of the fiscal year 2007-08 to $1.018 billion as against $966.994 million over the same months last year.

Share of oil in total import bill will increase to the highest ever, as oil price crossed $90 per barrel in the international market.

If this trend continues in the next few months, the import bill of crude oil will increase to around $6 billion by the end of June 2008.

Official figures released here by Federal Bureau of Statistics showed that petroleum products’ import dipped by 10.55 per cent to $987.060 million in the first quarter of the current fiscal year as against $1,103.487 million over the same months last year.

In absolute term, the total bill of oil — crude and petroleum products — stood at $2.005 billion in July-September of the current fiscal year as against $2.070 billion over the same period last year, indicating a negative growth of 3.13 per cent.

Like last year, import bill of oil had been the prime mover of trade deficit because of greater consumption. This year too, with upsurge in oil prices in international market, the import of crude oil would further witness increase in the months ahead.The second biggest component of the import bill in value was the machinery group. However, its imports increased by 5.63 per cent in July-Sept to $1.636 billion as against $1.549 billion over the same months last year.

The import bill of machinery was mainly pushed by an increase of 16.50 per cent in construction and mining, electrical machinery and apparatus 31.05 per cent, agriculture machinery 60.99 per cent and other machinery 11.05 per cent.

However, the power-generating machinery declined by more than 12.31 per cent and office machinery 16.38 per cent during the July-Sept period of the current fiscal over last year.

In the telecom sector, the import of mobile phones imports decreased by 19.75 per cent during the period under review over last year. However, the import of other apparatus of mobile phones increased by 39.80 per cent during the first three months of the current fiscal year over the same months of the last year.

Food items import declined by 3.08 per cent to $754.384 million during July-September of 2007-08 as against $778.323 million in the corresponding months of last year.

The import of milk products increased by 1.40pc, dry fruits 33.11pc, spices 0.80pc, soyabean oil 280.46pc, palm oil 73.18pc, and all other food items 34.59pc.

However, import of wheat declined by 40.84pc followed by sugar 97.31pc, tea 15.66pc and pulses 35.33pc during the period under review over last year.