Jasim Uddin Haroon

State-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) is pondering over import of finished petroleum products from new sources as it seeks to diversify sources of procurement of fuel, BPC officials said.

The three nations that have separately offered Bangladesh to sell fuel are Nigeria, the Philippines and Iran. Of them, Iran has earlier supplied fuel to Bangladesh.

The ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources last week gave its nod to the BPC communicate with the nations to purchase fuel, BPC sources claimed.

"We will talk to the three nations as the ministry has given us consent to talk them," Syed Mozammel Hoque, a BPC director (production), told the FE Thursday.

The officials said the premium offered by three nations is competitive.

They said BPC has been looking for new fuel suppliers as it is experiencing difficulties with the traditional suppliers relating to high premium and payments.

Apart from this, India that is bound by a deal to supply diesel though river routes has stopped shipment of the fuel.

"Although the agreement stipulates shipment of at least 120,000 tonnes a year India's Bharat Petroleum Corporation in last year supplied only around 20,000 tonnes of diesel," a senior official at the BPC said.

The Bharat Petroleum Corporation, an Assam-based oil refinery, stopped supplying fuel citing security reason.

BPC sources, however, said the three nations had placed proposals to supply finished fuel products few months back.

Currently, Bangladesh is purchasing finished fuel from Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) and a Malaysian company.

Earlier, BPC had a deal with the United Arab Emirates to supply the finished petroleum products, but it was not renewed after expiry.

The BPC imports around 1.2 million tonnes of crude oil from Saudi Arabia and other gulf countries a year.

BPC imports around 2.4 million finished fuel a year mainly from the KPC, and other sources.