The government is currently losing about 89 taka on every litre of diesel alone, the prime minister’s adviser on information and broadcasting, Zahed Ur Rahman, has said. He said the loss is being incurred because of the abnormal rise in prices on the international market and the war situation in the Middle East.
Zahed Ur Rahman gave the information in a written statement at the weekly briefing held in the conference room of the Press Information Department at the Secretariat on Tuesday afternoon. The press briefing was arranged to give information on the progress of work in various government ministries and on current matters.
At the briefing, Zahed Ur Rahman also said the government is losing about 109 crore taka a day on diesel alone. That means the government’s loss on diesel alone will come to about 40,000 crore taka a year.
The adviser also said that, despite the rise in fuel oil prices in the global context, oil prices in the country were held unchanged from March to August this year at an accepted loss of about 22,875 crore taka. But to reduce this continuing loss, save foreign currency and avoid the major risk of fuel oil being smuggled to neighbouring countries, the government has had to reset or adjust fuel oil prices.
The written statement also said that under the new rates, the price of diesel has been raised from 115 taka to 135 taka a litre, octane from 145 to 165 taka, petrol from 140 to 160 taka and kerosene from 135 to 155 taka.
Making a comparison with fuel oil prices in neighbouring and other Asian countries, the information adviser said a litre of diesel currently costs 134.76 taka in Kolkata, India; 164.83 taka in Myanmar; 161.24 taka in Nepal; 179.42 taka in Sri Lanka; 151.22 taka in Thailand; and 185.48 taka in Pakistan.
With the rate lowest in Bangladesh, a severe risk had arisen of oil bought with foreign currency earned by expatriates being smuggled across the border. By adjusting the price by 20 taka a litre to bring it into line with neighbouring countries, it will be possible to reduce Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation’s annual loss by about 10,000 crore taka.
Setting out steps towards self-sufficiency in energy, Zahed Ur Rahman said a plan has been adopted to drill 150 wells in the country by 2030 in order to reduce dependence on imports. As part of that, the opening of the Titas-28 well in Brahmanbaria on September 19 has begun supplying a further 12.5 million cubic feet of gas a day to the national grid. This will further increase gas supply to industry and the power sector. It is hoped that about 235 million cubic feet of gas a day can be added to the national grid from areas under BGFCL by 2035.
Press Information Department principal information officer Syed Abdal Ahmed and information and broadcasting ministry joint secretary Dr Md Alam Mostafa were present at the briefing.
Editor’s note: The state minister for power, energy and mineral resources, Anindya Islam Amit, and BNP’s acting secretary general Ruhul Kabir Rizvi have both put the government’s loss after the price adjustment at about 70 taka on every litre of diesel. The figure of about 89 taka a litre given in this report is consistent with the position before the adjustment of 21 September.