Oil imports plunge by around 60% YoY in April 2023: PBS

May 22, 2023 (MLN): The import bill of oil was recorded at $891.46 million in April 2023 plunging by 59.91% YoY and by 26.11% MoM, data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) showed.

As per the data, the import bill of oil in the previous month stood at $1.2 billion, and 2.23bn in April 2022.

Meanwhile, the share of petroleum products in the total import bill of $2.99bn stood at 29.74% in April 2023. It is pertinent to mention that the overall import bill has dropped by 21.46% MoM and 55% YoY compared to $3.81bn in March 2023 and $6.66bn in April 2022, respectively.

With regards to the transport sector, the import bill posted a drop of 32.74% MoM and a significant 82.73% YoY to $63.09m in April 2023 and against $365.27m in April 2022, mainly led by a decline in imports of road motor vehicles (build unit, CKD/SKD) that stood at $62.66m compared to $87.89m in March 2023 and $275.35m in April 2022.

The import of medicinal products went down by 47.75% YoY and 46.92% MoM in April 2032 to clock in at $71.25m.

Whereas, the country’s food imports narrowed by 33.61% MoM and 36.88% YoY to $429.11m in April 2023 as compared to $646.34m in March 2023 and $679.86m over the corresponding period last year.

Although, exports also declined by 29.11% in the month of April, this massive 60% plunge in import bills improved the county’s trade deficit by a significant margin, reflecting the impact of import restrictions lately.

Consequently, Pakistan's merchandise trade deficit for the month of April 2023 clocked in at $860m compared to a deficit of $3.76bn in April 2022, plummeting by 77.15% YoY.

Similarly, on a sequential basis, the deficit shrank by 40.44% MoM from $1.44bn in March 2023.

Amidst economic slowdown in the country’s major export market, energy shortages, and frequent closure of local manufacturing units, the exports registered a decrease of 26.23% YoY and around 10% MoM to $2.1bn.

Cumulatively, within 10MFY23, the trade deficit stood at $23.7bn, narrowed by 39.65% YoY compared to the deficit of $39.27bn recorded in the same period last year.

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