The Hindu Business Line : 3.9% increase in oil product sales in Dec

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New Delhi Feb.1 The domestic oil product sales in December saw a moderate increase of 3.9 per cent compared with the same month last year. Domestic sales rose to 10.5 million tonnes (mt) in the month under review compared to 10.1 mt in December 2005.

According to official sources, December saw a high growth for both motor spirit and high-speed diesel. Since dealers maintained lower inventories in November due to an anticipated price cut, it had a positive impact on sales as they uplifted more to bring inventories to normal levels, an official said. During the month under consideration, while diesel sales rose 6.9 per cent to 3.93 mt, petrol sales were up 9.6 per cent to 8,03,600 tonnes.

Besides, petrol and diesel sales also saw an increase due to the Supreme Court ruling banning the overloading of trucks, forcing more vehicles on to the roads. For the nine-month period (April-December) of the current financial year, the product sales rose by 5.2 per cent to 88.2 mt.

This was mainly due to the increase in demand for oil products from the industrial and agricultural sectors. The growth of 5.2 per cent was far higher than the Government expectation of 2.5 per cent annual growth for the financial year.

In April-December 2005, oil product sales totalled 83.8 mt. The annual oil product consumption was 117.5 mt from the earlier estimated 115 mt.

Import front

On the import front, oil product imports accelerated by 66.5 per cent to 1.54 mt in December. The oil product exports fell by 7.3 per cent to 2.12 mt in December. The country imported 9.1 mt of crude oil compared with 8.8 mt in the same month a year earlier.

For the April-December period, 13.1 mt of oil products were imported, up 21.6 per cent from the same period last year.