Qatar is Vietnam's largest liquefied gas import market.

According to preliminary statistics of the General Department of Customs, in June 2024, the whole country imported 292,836 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (gas), equivalent to nearly 183.44 million USD, with an average price of 626.4 USD/ton, up 7.26% in volume, up 8.09% in turnover and up 0.77% in price compared to May 2024.

In the first 6 months of 2024, the country imported over 1.56 million tons of liquefied gas, worth nearly 1.01 billion USD, with an average price of 644.75 USD/ton, up 35.84% in volume and 34.25% in turnover but down 1.17% in price compared to the same period in 2023.

Qatar is currently Vietnam's largest import market. In the first 6 months of 2024, this market supplied 321,903 tons of liquefied petroleum gas to Vietnam, equivalent to nearly 193.13 million USD, worth 599.96 USD/ton, a sharp increase of 250.49% in volume, 214.09% in turnover over the same period, accounting for 20.6% of the total volume and 19.17% of the total liquefied petroleum gas import turnover of the whole country.

In June 2024, imports from this market reached 44,200 tons, equivalent to nearly 27.16 million USD, priced at 614.42 USD/ton, up 5.48% in volume but down 1.8% in value compared to May 2024 and prices down 6.91%; in June 2023, our country did not import liquefied gas from this market.

Malaysia is the second largest market, with an import volume of 241,683 tons, equivalent to nearly 157.77 million USD, import price of 652.8 USD/ton, a sharp increase of 311.91% in volume, 312.91% in turnover and a slight increase of 0.24% in price compared to the first 6 months of 2023, accounting for 15.47% of the total volume and 15.66% of the total turnover.

Vietnam imported 321,903 tons of liquefied gas from the Qatar market, equivalent to nearly 193.13 million USD, worth 599.96 USD/ton.

Next is the Saudi Arabia market with 187,428 tons, worth nearly 125.44 million USD, priced at 669.26 USD/ton, down 47.24% in volume, down 44.8% in turnover but up 4.64% in price compared to the first 6 months of 2023, accounting for 12% of the total volume and 12.45% of the total liquefied gas import turnover of the whole country.

Currently, LPG in Vietnam is mainly used for civil or industrial purposes (food processing, paper making, plastic pellets, explosives, refrigerants, etc.), other applications from LPG products are still low such as the use of LPG in petrochemical technology. This leads to the scale of the LPG port warehouse system being mainly small ports, the capacity to import goods from large tonnage ships is still limited.

Regarding domestic LPG production: Dinh Co GPP Factory and Dung Quat Oil Refinery with an output of about 750,000 tons/year, accounting for about 45% of Vietnam's LPG demand.

According to the Vietnam Gas Association, the current situation of domestic gas supply is decreasing (to 7 billion ^m3 in 2025), the demand is increasing to more than 20 billion ^m3 in 2030. Therefore, importing LNG is an inevitable trend to serve the market's needs. According to the assessment, after nearly 20 years of exploitation (from 2018), domestic gas sources will gradually decrease, while additional gas sources from new mines in areas where gas sources are declining are not much.

It is expected that, to meet domestic LPG consumption demand, the storage infrastructure of LPG warehouses must reach a scale of about 3.5 - 4 million tons/year by 2025 and about 4.5 - 5 million tons/year by 2035, ensuring to meet the minimum reserve requirement of over 15 days of supply.

In July, domestic retail gas prices remained stable at the same level as in June following the trend of world gas prices. Specifically, the retail price of Petrolimex gas cylinders (including VAT) in July 2024 in the Hanoi market was 445,500 VND/12 kg household cylinder; 1,782,000 VND/48 kg industrial cylinder, unchanged from the price in June. Thus, since the beginning of the year, domestic gas prices have increased 3 times, decreased 3 times and remained unchanged once.

Source: https://congthuong.vn/qatar-la-thi-truong-nhap-khau-khi-dot-hoa-long-lon-nhat-cua-viet-nam-335138.html