'Oil refineries drain national wealth by dumping exports' Domestic oil refineries have siphoned off the nation's wealth to the tune of 1.6 trillion won ($1.45 million) by dumping their products overseas since 1998, a lawmaker claimed yesterday.

Rep. Kim Hak-song of the main opposition Grand National Party said in a parliamentary inspection of the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy that the refineries have exported oil stocks at prices far lower than their import prices.

According to data unveiled by Rep. Kim, the export prices of oil products were lower than their import prices by 8.7 won per liter for gasoline, 25 won for kerosene, 17.2 won for diesel and 16.9 won for bunker C oil.

By volume, a total of 8.41 million barrels of gasoline, 12.63 million barrels of kerosene, 57.1 million barrels of diesel and 59.4 million barrels of bunker C oil have been exported that way, causing financial losses of 1.6 trillion won to the nation.

In the parliamentary inspection, Rep. Kim Bang-lim of the ruling New Millennium Democratic Party also pointed out that the nation's top five oil companies have made undue profits by selling oil products at higher prices than their export prices.

The profiteering amounted to 2.8 trillion won and translated into an additional financial burden of 210,000 won on average to each household, the lawmaker contended.

"After comparing the ex-factory price, which combines the import price and distribution costs, with the consumer price, it was discovered that the companies have taken 50 won more for gasoline per liter, 52 won for kerosene, 48 won for diesel and 41 won for bunker C oil in a unreasonable way," he said.

Rep. Kim said that the companies are also selling some 30 million drums of oil products in illicit transactions through brokers each year and evading a large amount of taxes. The tax firms dodged about 540 billion won last year, he said.

http://koreaherald.co.kr/news/2000/10/__05/20001020_0557.htm

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), October 19, 2000