Indian Oil Consumption Slow Even After Lockdown Opens Up

Last updated on February 14th, 2023 at 01:15 pm

Despite the economy showing signs of progress and recover post a long 90 day lockdown period, India’s fuel consumption is not going seeing an upward movement.

Blame it on many corporate still opting to work from home, the demand for fuel has not gone by since June 2020. According to government data, the demand has gone down more in July since any year-on-year comparison.

According to the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, demand of even refined oil had fallen miserably to 15.68 tonnes in July, a 11.7 percent drop. Diesel usage has also fallen miserably down for a country that depends heavily on its consumption in the field of manufacturing and transportation. It also meets the irrigation needs of a country that continues to be agriculture driven.

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On an annual basis, demand for diesel has dropped by 19 percent.

Additionally, the natural calamities of floods can be attributed as just one more reason for feeble demand. India’s top refiner India Oil Corp has been forced to operate its refineries on half its capacity and it feels that it cannot see the demand coming back to normal in the near future. Even the sale of bitumen, a petroleum byproduct has seen a sharp decrease of 4.4 percent on an annual basis.