ISLAMABAD: Petroleum group imports have decreased by 7.63 per cent to $12.084 billion during July-March 2024 from $13.083 billion during the same period a year before, Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) said on Thursday.
Official imports’ data of selected commodities uploaded by the PBS on its website noted that petroleum products’ imports have decreased by 21.02 per cent to $4.609 billion during the period under review from $5.836 billion.
However, imports of petroleum crude increased by 3.26 per cent to $ 3.986 billion from $3.860 billion a year before, imports of natural gas liquefied increased by 1.99 per cent to 2.908 billion in July-March 2024 from $3.860 billion during the same period a year before and petroleum gas liquefied increased by 8.56 per cent to $2.908 billion from $2.852 billion.
However, imports of machinery group has increased by 30.30 per cent to $5.854 billion during July-March 2024 from $4.493 billion in July-March 2023; however, import of power generation machinery decreased by 25.63 per cent to $296.093 million during July-March 2024 from $398.109 million during July-March 2023 and imports of textile machinery decreased by 63.68 per cent to $104.007 million from $286.371 million.
There was an increase of 41.28 per cent in imports of office machinery including data-processing equipment to $352.029 million during the period under review from $249.167 million.
The data also reveals that imports of transport group decreased by 19.17 per cent to $1.239 billion during July-March 2024 from $1.533 billion during July-March 2023 and on month on month imports of transport group in March 2024 over March 2023 increased by 39.65 per cent to $129.923 million from $93.094 million but decreased by 3.14 per cent over $132.321 million during previous month of February 2024.
Monthly analysis of the data showed that imports of food group increased by 28.29 per cent in March 2024 over March 2023 to $829.164 million from $646.340 million and 12.08 per cent over $739.819 million during February 2024. However, imports of machinery group also increased by 139.62 percent to $811.865million in March 2024, as opposed to $338.816 million in March 2023 and 17.78 per cent over $689.294 million during February 2024.
Imports of power generation machinery reflected an increase of 18.19 per cent in March 2023-2024 to $28.263 million from $23.76 million in March 2022-2023 and 23.76 per cent over previous month’s (February 2023-24) $22.837 million whereas month-on-month data also showed a decline of 49.12 per cent in imports of textile machinery.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024