In the fiscal year that ended on March 31, India’s crude oil import bill then doubled to $119 billion, as global energy prices skyrocketed following the restoration of demand and the crisis in Ukraine.
According to data from the energy ministry’s Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell, India, the world’s third-largest oil consumption and importing nation, spent $119.2 billion in 2021-22 (April 2021 to March 2022), up from $62.2 billion the previous fiscal year (PPAC).
It spent $13.7 billion just in March when oil prices reached a 14-year high. This compares to $8.4 billion spent in the same month the previous year. Oil prices began to rise in January, and by the following month, they had above $100 per barrel, before reaching $140 per barrel in early March. Prices have since fallen and are now hovering around $106 per barrel.
India bought 212.2 million tonnes of crude oil in 2021-22, up from 196.5 million tonnes the previous year, according to PPAC. This was, however, less than the 227 million tonnes of pre-pandemic imports in 2019-20. In 2019-20, the United States spent $101.4 billion on oil imports. Before being sold to automobiles and other consumers, imported crude oil is refined into value-added products such as gasoline and diesel at oil refineries.
India, which is 85.5 percent reliant on imports for crude oil, has a surplus of refining capacity and exports some petroleum products, but it lacks production of cooking gas LPG, which is imported from countries such as Saudi Arabia. In 2021-22, the country consumed 202.7 million tonnes of petroleum products, up from 194.3 million tonnes in the previous fiscal year but lower than the pre-pandemic demand of 214.1 million tonnes in 2019-20.
Petroleum product imports totaled 40.2 million tonnes worth $24.2 billion in fiscal 2021-22. 61.8 million tonnes of petroleum products, on the other hand, were exported for $42.3 billion. In addition, India paid $11.9 billion in 2021-22 on LNG imports totaling 32 billion cubic meters. This compares to $7.9 billion spent on gas imports of 33 billion cubic meters in the previous fiscal year and $9.5 billion spent on imports of 33.9 billion cubic meters in 2019-20.
After adjusting for exports, the net oil and gas import cost were $113 billion, up from $63.5 billion in 2020-21 and $92.7 billion in 2019-20. India paid $62.2 billion on crude oil imports in the prior fiscal year 2020-21, as global oil prices remained low in the aftermath of the COVID-19 epidemic.
Higher crude oil import bills are projected to hurt macroeconomic indices. Because of a persistent fall in domestic output, the country’s reliance on imports has grown. According to PPAC data, the country produced 32.2 million tonnes of crude oil in 2019-20, which declined to 30.5 million tonnes the following year and 29.7 million tonnes in FY22.
According to PPAC, India’s reliance on oil imports was 85 percent in 2019-20, then fell to 84.4 percent the following year before rising to 85.5 percent in 2021-22.
