India will stop importing petroleum products, says gov't

India is laying emphasis on developing alternative fuel economy and will soon stop importing petroleum products, the country's government has said.

"We are going to develop this country where our import of petroleum will be zero. We are promoting alternative fuel like ethanol, methanol, bio-CNG ..." Indian Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari reportedly said at a conference in the national capital Tuesday.

Stressing that the socio-economic situation is not good and agriculture is facing acute problems, the minister said: "This alternative fuel economy is going to change the socio-economic picture of agriculture and rural economy."

"This is time for the country to plan the way by which we can save the life of people in rural and agriculture sectors. We can make ethanol from biomass that is cotton straw, wheat straw, rice straw and bagasse. Even from municipal waste we can make ethanol," he added.

However, India's domestic crude oil production fell for the fourth year in a row in 2015-16, even as oil consumption plummeted, thus pushing up the country's import dependence.

India's import dependence on oil rose to over 80 percent in 2015-16 from 78.5 percent in 2014-15 even though Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set a target of bringing this down to 67 percent by the year 2022. Endit