Vietnam is estimated to see a year-on-year surge of 53.3% in crude oil export value, despite a10.8-% decrease in export volume, in the first eight months of this year.
Between January and August, Vietnam is set to export nearly 9 million tonnes of crude oil worth roughly US$7.9 billion, mainly to China, Singapore, Japan and the United States, according to the country's general Statistical Office on Monday.
The Vietnamese government has recently asked state-owned Vietnam National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) to exploit 16.2-16.3 million tonnes of crude oil this year, instead of 16 million tonnes in the initial plan.
Vietnam is estimated to import 9.6 million tonnes of petroleum products totalling US$9.1 billion in the first eight months of this year, up 13.7% and 94.3%, respectively, the statistics office said.
Despite being Southeast Asia's third largest crude oil exporter, Vietnam still relies entirely on petroleum product imports as it lacks its own refineries.
Dung Quat, Vietnam's first refinery with an annual processing capacity of 6.5 million tonnes of crude oil under construction with investment of US$2.5 billion in central Quang Ngai province, is scheduled to operate in February 2009. Its sole investor is PetroVietnam.
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