The National Iranian Oil Company’s gasoline exports revenues decreased by 75% in 2021 compared to a year ago.
The state-owned firm earned close to $3 billion in revenues by selling the fuel to neighboring states, including Iraqi Kurdistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Armenia and some African states, which indicates a sharp decline to $750 million in 2021, Tasnim News Agency reported.
According to the Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration's Statistics Office, NIOC exported around 2 million tons of gasoline between March 2021 and March 2022, down 75% compared with the corresponding period of a year ago when the volume amounted to 8 million tons.
The National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Company, a subsidiary of NIOC, produces 105 million liters of gasoline per day, of which 100 ml/d are used domestically.
The Oil Ministry started offering oil products, namely gasoline and diesel, on the Iran Energy Exchange in 2019 when daily consumption was around 85 million liters.
Each liter of gasoline is sold at 4 cents in Iran and the same amount of fuel costs 100 cents in Afghanistan.
Figures released by the Headquarters to Combat Smuggling of Goods and Foreign Exchange show that close to 9 million liters of oil byproducts, including diesel and gasoline, are smuggled out daily.
According to Mojtaba Mahfouzi, a lawmaker from Abadan, the huge figure (9 ml/d) indicates that the illicit and dangerous fuel trafficking is a very organized business that cannot be only undertaken by smugglers in and around borders.
“There should be a mafia-like organization behind the scene controlling the whole thing, but what we are seeing is a couple of smugglers. All related organizations and executive bodies in the country should be held accountable for the crime,” he said.
The illicit trade is carried out systemically and with the support of well-placed lobbies that know how to cheat and dodge the law-enforcement agencies.
Among neighbors, Turkey, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan are the main destinations of the smuggled fuel.
