A plan by Iran to halt petrol imports and begin rationing is unlikely to begin soon, a senior MP said Sunday, two days after the Islamic republic's oil minister said the measure would start in September.
"It is unlikely that the rationing of petrol becomes operational" by that date, the head of the Iranian parliament's energy committee, Kamal Daneshyar, was quoted as saying by the IRNA agency.
The MP said that while parliament had given the government the green light to bring down Iran's massive petrol consumption levels, this was conditional to "expanding the public transport fleet and fuelling cars with natural gas".
Daneshyar said neither of these conditions had been met, while another MP also alluded to the economic of such a measure. "The issue of rationing petrol is not serious. If it happened, the entire society will suffer," Mohammad Khoshchehreh told state television.
On Friday, Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hameneh said Iran - whose refineries cannot keep up with domestic demand - was putting an end to billions of dollars of imports in order to provide free-for-all subsidised petrol.
Iran's refineries have a capacity of 40 million litres of petrol a day, but demand is close to 70 million litres. The shortfall has up to now been met by spending billions of dollars each year on imported petrol. The government then takes a double hit by selling fuel at just 800 rials (nine US cents, or 34 cents a gallon). Super costs 1,100 rials (12 cents, or 45 cents a gallon).
On Sunday, the oil minister was quoted as saying that private car owners would soon be allowed just five litres (1.32 gallons) a day.
"As there is nothing provided for petrol imports in the second half of this (Iranian) year's budget ... the imports will naturally stop and petrol will be rationed," he had said on Friday.