Since Pakistan imports around 19 million tons of crude oil and petroleum products annually and all these imports are planned at the two ports of Karachi i.e. KPT and PQA/FOTCO. Keeping these localities over observation, the Petroleum Division has reportedly proposed conversion of FOTCO to a purely furnished products/fuels jetty along with the shifting of condensate/naphtha export vessels to Keamari (KPT). The oil industry has also highlighted various port constraints resulting in in wastage of time with delays in berthing of vessels and consequent incidence of demurrage. FOTCO jetty at Port Qasim has a designed capacity of 9 million tons per annum. But, from the last two years, it handled 4.2 and 4.9 million tons respectively. With a half of the total capacity, Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) has incurred demurrages to the tune of $ 9.7 million (about Rs 1.5 billion) during FY 2019-20, although oil industry has adequate storage capacity at PQA. Moreover, due to depressed demand and reduced imports under Covid-19, the economy has been affected badly. Under certain factors such as non-availability of night navigation, intermix handling monsoon season, traffic of LNG vessels, which are badly impacting discharge capacity has resulted in miss-handling of much lower tonnage. In order to cope up with these factors, a proposal has been proposed to the Ministry of Maritime Affairs. To ensure the effective management/maintenance of oil supply/logistic chain, a detailed plan has been outlined that will facilitate the oil companies along with flexibility of operations and security of supply chain of petroleum products.
Menu
