Indonesia's crude and condensate exports fell sharply in October, while imports of both items also declined in the same month, according to the latest data from Statistics Indonesia.
The drops in imports and exports reflect Jakarta's ongoing efforts to increase dependency on domestic oil as the economy battles against a widening current account deficit.
Indonesia exported 608,830 mt of crude oil, and 121,780 mt of condensate in October, down 47% and 26.5%, respectively, from the same period a year earlier, Statistics Indonesia data showed.
With less oil shipped out to overseas buyers, the country imported a combined total of 1.499 million mt of crude and condensate in October, down 22.9% year on year, the data showed.
The recent sharp decline in international outright oil prices came as a big relief for Indonesia -- Southeast Asia's biggest energy consumer -- as it could trim its crude and fuel procurement costs to reduce its widening current account deficit.
However, with the Indonesian rupiah's prolonged weakness against the US dollar hurting the country's purchasing power in the international energy markets, state-run Pertamina has been focusing on using more domestic crude since the second quarter.
Indonesia's flagship light-end crude grades including Senipah condensate, Bontang condensate, Handil Mix and Attaka have almost dissipated from the Asian spot market as most of the output is processed by Pertamina's domestic refineries, industry sources said.
In addition, trade sources at South Korean and Japanese companies that regularly lift term barrels of Indonesian heavy sweet crudes including Minas, Duri and Cinta, recently told S&P Global Platts that monthly allocation volumes have been consistently declining over the past decade.
The sources also indicated that hardly any Indonesian crude grades were seen available in the regional spot market so far this year.
"Two reasons ... one is the aging fields and fast natural decline in production and second is local companies absorbing more and more domestic output, leading to less exports," said a source at a Japanese integrated trading firm that has a term Indonesian heavy crude supply contract.
Furthermore, Indonesia recently took a step forward to boost the country's self-sufficiency in oil products with state-owned Pertamina striving to expand its refining facilities to reduce fuel import bills over the coming years.
Pertamina awarded a consortium led by South Korea's SK Engineering and Hyundai Engineering Co. Ltd. to increase the capacity of Balikpapan refinery from 260,000 b/d currently to 360,000 b/d, Platts reported last week.
The Balikpapan refinery expansion will help Indonesia slash diesel imports as domestic output could increase by around 30,000 b/d, according to Adiatma Sardjito, Pertamina's vice president for communications.
"Growing refining capacity in Indonesia will naturally lead to even a sharper drop in the country's crude exports ... unless there are significant new oil discoveries that is," said a low sulfur crude trader based in Singapore.
Over January-October, Indonesia exported a combined total of 8.763 million mt of crude and condensate, down 22.9% from what was shipped out in the same period last year.
Imports came in at 14.55 million mt over the first 10 months, almost steady from 14.875 million mt received over the corresponding period a year ago.
