Volumes of petrol and diesel oil sold are up 10% since the beginning of the year against last year, despite the unprecedented rise in pump prices, after oil prices repeatedly hit record highs.
"A large part of the advance is due to transport companies. Whilst in countries such as Hungary and Slovakia fuel sales have remained around the same level as last year, Romania is developing in full swing, which means it has significant transport needs. Since the beginning of the year, the market has grown by around 10%, despite the decline in the number of vehicles sold," says Zsolt Szalay, country chairman of MOL Romania, the local branch of the Hungarian petroleum group MOL.
The growth rate has been calculated based on data provided by petroleum companies, members of the Romanian Oil Association, which include all six leading oil companies on the local market- Petrom, Rompetrol, Lukoil, MOL, OMV and Agip.
The data concerns fuel sales derived in the first five months of the year compared with the similar period in 2007. Last year, the overall market growth rate stood at around 7%. According to the MOL Romania representative, over 70% of the company's sales are guaranteed, because the fuel goes to the commercial fleet and to loyal clients, via a card system.
"I don't think we can talk about a psychological threshold for fuel sales. There was talk of 4 RON per litre being a psychological threshold, but nothing happened. Some types of fuels cost over 4.8 RON at present, but sales are still going up," added the MOL Romania representative.
Another factor that could boost the fuel market is the rather low number of cars on the local market. Hungary, for instance, has 316 cars per one thousand inhabitants; in Slovakia there are 243 units per thousand inhabitants, while in Romania the figure is just 163 vehicles.
Fuel consumption matches the number of vehicles. While in Hungary, annual consumption per capita amounts to 300 litres and in Slovakia consumption stands at around 250 litres, in Romania it is below 200 litres, whilst the three above mentioned countries are the three major markets where the MOL group operates.
"When it comes to individual consumers, there are several noticeable trends- either fuel budgets are preserved, which inevitably leads to a decline in the volume of fuel sold, or the budget is adjusted, but it is difficult to say what share these clients have in the overall volume of sales," explains Szalay.
According to him, there has been no noticeable change in consumer preferences, i.e. petrol has not been restored as the fuel of choice for consumers, despite the fact that since the beginning of the year the price of diesel has been higher than petrol.
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