Pertamina to raise term crude purchases from 20% to 80%: Report

State-owned Pertamina aims to reverse its ratio of term to spot crude imports from the current 20:80 to 80:20, Platts reported on Friday.

"We currently import 20% of our crude requirements on term basis, and secure 80% in the spot market. In future, we would like to import 80% on term basis, and 20% on spot," an official of Pertamina was quoted by Platts as saying.

Pertamina wanted to procure most of the incremental term crude volumes via its 100%-owned trading subsidiary Petral, the official said, citing company president Baihaki Hakim.

"We would like to empower Petral as our trading arm to secure the 80% of term crude," he said. "We also want to boost Petral's business profile, and support it to make it a bigger company."

Pertamina disbanded its Suharto-era trading subsidiary Perta Oil and set up Petral last year.

Meanwhile, over fiscal year 2001 (January-December), Indonesia imported a cumulative 115-mil bbl of crude, valued at Indonesian Rupiah 30-trillion (about $3-bil) and 83-mil bbl of products worth Rupiah 25-trillion (about $2.5-bil), Pertamina president Baihaki Hakim said.

The crude came from Saudi Arabia, West Africa, Malaysia, China and Vietnam. Refined products were imported from Kuwait (high octane mogas component or HOMC) and from Singapore, he added. (Robert)