An Indian oil refinery has unveiled plans to export up to 500,000 tonnes of petrol a year to Myanmar to meet rising demand fuelled by strong economic growth, Bloomberg reported on August 18
The Numaligarh Refinery at Morangi in Assam was in talks with the government about the plan, its managing director Mr P. Padmanabhan, told Bloomberg in an interview in New Delhi on August 10.
“The growth opportunity in Myanmar is fabulous,” he said.
Padmanabhan said the refinery planned to eventually export 500,000 tonnes of petrol a year, equivalent to about a quarter of Myanmar’s estimated current daily consumption of 50,000 barrels.
The refinery was prepared to send the petrol by road in tankers until it built a pipeline to the Myanmar border town of Tamu, in Sagaing Region.
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“If the price is attractive in Myanmar, I’m willing to start tomorrow,” Padmanabhan told Bloomberg.
It quoted London-based BMI Research as saying Myanmar imported more than 60 percent of its refined fuel and three domestic refineries capable of producing 57,000 barrels a day operated at 30 percent capacity in 2015.
BMI Research estimated that fuel consumption in Myanmar would expand at an average of six percent a year between 2016 and 2020, outpacing Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand.
Numaligarh Refinery is a subsidiary of India’s second-biggest state-owned refiner, Bharat Petroleum Corp.
The report said Indian Oil Corp, the country’s biggest state-owned refiner, was also keen on exploring opportunities to sell fuel in Myanmar.
Indian Oil’s chairman, Mr B. Ashok, told Bloomberg in March the company had three refineries in the northeast that could supply fuel to Myanmar.
