HANOI, March 13 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam is planning to increase the national reserves of crude oil and oil products to 15 days of net imports by 2025 and 30 days by 2030, from the current 9 days, to ensure its energy security, Vietnam News Agency reported on Monday.
The Southeast Asian country would need 4.1 trillion Vietnamese dong (172 million U.S. dollars) for the expansion of its fuel buffer, said the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
However, the government is spending 1.5 trillion Vietnamese dong (63 million dollars) a year on stocking up fuel products, or only equivalent to 37 percent of the needed funds to acquire additional fuel for the stockpile, Nguyen Hong Dien, the Minister of Industry and Trade, reported to the National Assembly's Economic Committee.
Vietnam's petroleum reserves currently stand at around 300,000 cubic meters per year, equivalent to 9 days of net imports and 7 days of consumption, according to a report from the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
With a thin stockpile, it is difficult to compensate for supply disruptions amid a global surge in energy prices. Last year Vietnam was faced with a shortage of fuel on a large scale for the first time, forcing regulators to adjust retail fuel prices every 10 days instead of 15 days.
The trade ministry forecast this year's total fuel supply would grow 15 percent from last year to meet rising demand as the country is recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Vietnam imported 1.93 million tons of gasoline and oil products in January and February, up 43.1 percent from a year earlier as costs jumped 56.3 percent to 1.7 billion U.S. dollars, said the General Statistics Office, adding that Vietnam's crude oil imports more than doubled in the same period to 1.78 million tons worth 1.1 billion dollars.
Vietnam is storing its national fuel reserves at about 20 commercial storage facilities, raising concerns over the level of transparency in storage inflows and outflows, between the national reserves and commercial inventories at trading companies, said the trade ministry.
In 2017, the government requested domestic refineries to maintain crude oil stockpiles worth 15 days of their processing capacity and 10 days of output, or equivalent to 30-35 days of the country's net imports.
To keep the supply stable, the government also asked importers and distributors to maintain their own stockpiles.
Vietnam currently has two refineries, the Nghi Son Refinery in the northern province of Thanh Hoa and the Dung Quat Refinery in the central province of Quang Ngai, meeting 70-80 percent of its total fuel needs, and a network of 38 distributors and 17,000 gas stations. ■