NEW DELHI: India is the world’s second largest importer of LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) after China and remains ahead of Japan as the Narendra Modi government’s drive to provide clean cooking fuel to millions of poor families boosted household demand by nearly 8% in 2017-18.
The Prime Minister may flag the success of the Ujjwala scheme — one of his government’s flagship social programmes aimed at delivering “energy justice” to the poor — to emphasise the potential of India’s energy market and need for an equitable global oil pricing regime when he addresses policy-makers and oil industry bosses at the 16th International Energy Forum ministerial here on Wednesday. The IEF is a grouping of 72 countries accounting for 90% of global supply and demand for oil and gas.
India beat Japan in 2016 to become the world’s third-largest consumer of crude oil after the US and China. Both International Energy Agency and Opec see India as the main driver of growth in global oil demand for the next decade.
Available data indicate India’s imports of LPG – a byproduct of refining industry – in 2017-18 surpassing 11 million tonne in 2016-17 on the back of the Ujjwala scheme adding volume to overall demand.
Recently, international media reports quoting shipping data pegged India’s LPG import at 2.4 million tonne in December, exceeding China’s import of 2.3 million tonne for the first time. But India still trails China’s average monthly import of 2.7 million with 1.7 million tonne.
While a monthly import spike may be caused by a variety of factors, the signs of consumption growth are, nevertheless, all there. Not surprising then that the rapid progress of the Ujjwala scheme under oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s watch, is estimated to push up household demand for LPG to more than 27 million tonne by 2022, up from more than 18 million tonne now.
This is also because of the government adding LPG consumers in normal subsidised and other categories in parallel to the Ujjwala scheme. Household consumer base currently stands at approximately 21 crore, representing a growth of 6% over the previous year.
Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com