Sri Lanka energy minister warns petrol stocks about to run dry

• Sri Lanka’s energy minister has issued a stern warning regarding the nation’s gasoline supplies.
• Sri Lanka has stopped selling gasoline to the general public because of severe fuel shortages.
• The island nation is going through its biggest economic crisis since independence.

In light of Sri Lanka’s greatest economic crisis in more than 70 years, the country’s energy minister has issued a stern warning regarding the nation’s gasoline supplies.

According to Kanchana Wijesekera on Sunday, the country only had enough gasoline to last under normal demand for less than a day.

The next cargo of gasoline, he added, wouldn’t be arriving for another two weeks.

Due to financial difficulties, Sri Lanka this week stopped selling gasoline and diesel for non-essential vehicles. This includes fuel, food, and medication imports.

According to Mr. Wijesekera, the nation still had 12,774 tonnes of fuel and 4,061 tonnes of gasoline in its reserves.

The following gasoline cargo is anticipated to arrive between July 22 and 23.

Although Mr. Wijesekera cautioned that the country does not have enough money to pay for planned fuel and crude oil imports, a supply of diesel is anticipated to arrive at the weekend.

He claimed that compared to the $587 million required for its scheduled exports, Sri Lanka’s central bank could only provide $125 million for gasoline purchases.

Mr. Wijesekera stated that seven vendors were owed $800 million by the nation for purchases made earlier this year.

It happened after Sri Lanka imposed a weeklong ban on the selling of petrol for private vehicles.

According to experts, it is the first nation to adopt such a dramatic measure as to stop selling gasoline to the general public since the 1970s oil crisis, when fuel was rationed in the US and Europe.

The 22 million-strong island nation is going through its biggest economic crisis since achieving independence from the UK in 1948 because it cannot buy adequate necessities due to a lack of foreign currency.

Acute shortages of food, medication, and gasoline have contributed to the country’s record-high cost of living because so many people depend on automobiles for their means of transportation.

A new round of negotiations on a $3 billion (£2.5 billion) rescue package with Sri Lanka were completed last Thursday by a team from the International Monetary Fund.

Even though no decision has yet been made, the panel claimed that it has made “substantial progress on outlining a macroeconomic and structural policy package” in a statement.

The statement continued by saying that it had “witnessed some of the sufferings now encountered by the Sri Lankan people, especially the poor and vulnerable who are affected disproportionately by the crisis.”

In an effort to obtain low-cost oil supplies, the cash-strapped nation has also dispatched representatives to Russia and Qatar, two of the world’s largest energy producers.

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