The LPG Association of Pakistan (LPGAP) has requested the federal government to take prompt action against excessive imports of LPG through land route as it is not only hurting the local producers but also causing substantial financial loss to the national exchequer. Addressing a hurriedly-called briefing on Sunday, LPG Association of Pakistan Chairman Farooq Iftikhar expressed serious reservation over irresponsible statement in the media regarding high consumer price of LPG. Presently, he said, the maximum retail consumer price is Rs 110/- per kg despite the facts that the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) has allowed selling up to Rs 130/- per kg for the consumers. "Unchecked imports of LPG through land route needs to be stopped and we request the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Petroleum, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) to immediate address the issue," requested Iftikhar.
He said the local LPG price for marketing companies is Rs 112,000 per ton at their plants and the local producers are charging marketing companies 17 percent General Sales Tax (GST) along with the Petroleum Development Levy of Rs 4669/MT. "In this context, the marketing companies also incur substantial operational expenses as inferior quality imported LPG costs $500 per ton. Additionally, they pay 10 percent sales tax and nil regulated duty," Iftikhar said and added that stocks of local LPG with producers and marketing companies are piling up because of cheap LPG imports.
He added that they will now pile up further on account of substantial increase in local producer price announced by Ogra without considering ground realities. The OGRA needs to seriously revise its pricing formula after consulting marketing companies and producers and taking all factors in focus, he demanded.
"Excessive imports of LPG is not only affecting sale of local good quality LPG but is also creating severe environmental and health issues amongst the low income citizens of the country. The Ministry of Petroleum and the Ministry of Finance are presently not taking serious notice of wastage of valuable foreign exchange, evasion of taxes besides transfer of funds through Hundi despite the issue being highlighted by us at all forums," he deplored. Iftikhar further said that imports from Iran through land route are extremely disturbing for the local industry as they are heavily discounting the price of LPG and are out to destroy their local industry because of sanctions.
He claimed that some importers are also selling Iranian LPG to un-register players, causing substantial revenue loss to the government. Over imports of low quality LPG through land routes is taking place solely because of MP&NR slackness to match prices of the local product when CP price of LPG changes.
The government must reduce its prices by Rs 10,000 per MT immediately to discourage low quality imports to bridge gaps between the demand and supply, he added.
Comments
Comments are closed.