Petroleum Shortages In Flood-Hit Areas
The government is facing difficulties in unloading oil consignments from ships because of port congestion and infrastructure limitations, resulting in supply shortages in flood affected areas of Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Northern parts of the country.
Sources in the petroleum ministry told Dawn on Monday that the country’s oil consumption had dropped by about 50 per cent after the recent floods as transport activities had substantially slumped because of damage caused to the road infrastructure.
They said the stocks of petroleum products diesel, furnace oil and petrol were enough for more than 28 days of the country’s usual requirement but transportation problems were resulting in short supplies in many parts of the country, particularly in Sindh and Gilgit-Baltistan.
A senior government official said that because of supply disruptions, there were reports of overcharging and artificial shortage by the private petroleum dealers in many areas where stocks were more than enough for the local consumption.
He said the petroleum ministry issued a directive on Monday to the provincial governments and Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) to take note of the situation and conduct raids on petrol pumps to ensure smooth sales and sufficient stocks of petroleum products.
He said the provincial governments and Ogra had also been asked to seal premises and impose fines on dealers who were engaged in short supplies or overcharging customers.
The sources said at least four ships loaded with furnace oil petrol and diesel were waiting for unloading at the Karachi port.
He said a number of locations along the Indus Highway in Sindh including Shikarpur, Kashmore and Jacobabad could not be supplied with petroleum products because of heavy floods and inundation of roads and other infrastructure facilities.
Likewise, oil supplies in Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were also facing shortages of petroleum products due to heavy damages to roads, bridges and allied transport network. They said the government initially considered to airlift petroleum products in these areas but was now finding it difficult to access such locations even through helicopters.
[via DAWN News]
