New Delhi [India]: Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri on Wednesday said that global economic recovery can be undermined if energy prices remain high. He further said that the consumption of petroleum products has increased by 15 per cent post-COVID-19 pandemic. Addressing the India Energy Forum organised by CERAWeek, Puri said, “The impact of these rising prices would be on all economies, but particularly so on large developing countries like India retrieve development challenges. Consumption of petroleum products has increased as compared to the pre-COVID-19 pandemic. Consumption of petrol is 15 per cent higher and that of diesel is 6 to 10 per cent above the pre-COVID-19 period. So, economic activity is recovering.” He further said, “Crude oil import bill of India has jumped from dollars 8.8 billion in the quarter ending June 2020 to 24 billion dollars for the quarter ending June 2021. Due to the extreme volatility of global oil prices and the movement, petrol, diesel, PNG, and CNG have risen to the highest levels across the country.” “This is in everyone’s interest that we sustained global economic recovery, and therefore it is an interest of both the producing countries and the importing countries to have stable and affordable energy”, added Puri.
