Shortage of LPG feared in Ramazan

LPG Chamber of Pakistan has warned of LPG shortage during the holy month of Ramazan following a refusal of the LPG terminal company, a subsidiary of Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC), dealing with LPG importers to allow handling of two LPG ships. The government of Pakistan is a major shareholder in SSGC and this act by state-owned terminal company has not only led to multimillion rupees loss to the importers but also to the national exchequer due to revenue loss.
Addressing a press conference, Regional Chairman LPG Standing Committee of FPCCI Irfan Khokhar said that state-owned LPG terminal company had refused to entertain two ships of LPG imports carrying 11,900 metric tons within a week resulting accumulative loss of Rs 40 million to national exchequer. He said that LPG terminal charged $32 per metric ton and so this company caused a multimillion rupees loss to the national exchequer.
In routine, the LPG demand is over 3,000 to 3,500 metric tons per month that would jump up to 7,000 metric tons in the month of Ramazan to stabilise prices. The bureaucratic tactics of state-owned terminal company would cause shortage of product due to blocking LPG imports that would lead to increase in prices.
He said that one LPG importer had already switched its business to private terminal due to problems created by the stated-own LPG terminal company and one more LPG importer had been blacklisted due to filing case against the company to recover the LPG stock kept with LPG terminal on account of security deposit.
Khokhar said that terminal company bought by SSGC was a dead one and importers had played a key role in reviving the company due to imports. He said that Engro Terminal, a private company, had handled a total of 1.2 million tons products and out of it, it handled 226,000 metric tons in 2016 by operating for 14 days. He said that a subsidiary of the SSGC had handled 214,000 million tons in a month time and both terminals had the same storage capacity. He said that last year 1.2 million metric tons of LPG was sold in Pakistani market and out of it, 0.53 million metric tons of LPG was imported to meet domestic needs. He said that he had held meeting with high-ups of company and managing director SSGC had chaired that meeting. The SSGC chief had assured to take action but no remedy had been done so far, he added.