PetroVietnam has achieved three targets for this year ahead of schedule. (Illustrative photo: VNA)

Those targets are total revenue, consolidated pre-tax profit and contribution to the State budget.

PetroVietnam achieved the impressive results in the context of a declining trend in the world economy with the global PMI in August further dropping to 50.3, a 26-month low. OPEC forecast a 3.1% growth for the world economy this year, down from the 3.5% forecast in May.

In the country, the domestic economy is suffering from the impacts of rising inflation in the world and the disruption of global supply chains. Besides, energy prices continue to undergo unpredictable changes, demand for fertilizer dropped and gas exploitation for electricity generation continued to be lower than planned, thus affecting PetroVietnam’s operation.

To counter the unfavourable factors, the group has applied synchronous technical solutions and maintain exploitation activities at high level, resulting in a 23% increase in crude oil output over the eight-month target.

The group produced 4.56 million tonnes of petrol and oil (excluding the output of Nghi Son refinery), exceeding the 8-month plan by 8% and up 5% year on year, meeting domestic demand.

PetroVietnam also produced 1.22 million tonnes of urea fertilizer for the domestic market, exceeding the 8-month plan by 10% and up 9% year on year.

It paid 90.6 trillion VND (3.85 billion USD at current exchange rate) to the State coffer, surpassing the yearly plan by 40%. In 2021, the group contributed 112.5 trillion VND (nearly 4.8 billion USD) to the State budget, up 80% from the year’s target and equivalent to 36% of the 2020 figure.

In August, the group also implemented other business and production activities on schedule, while promoting cooperation with domestic and international organisations and businesses like banks and energy groups.

Addressing a regular meeting for September, PetroVietnam Chairman Hoang Quoc Vuong again underlined that the group has an important mission of ensuring energy security for national development, thus contributing to building an independent and self-reliant economy.

He instructed affiliates to give priority to tackling most urgent issues in the remaining months of 202 and remaining years in the five-year plan for 2021-2025.

Based on the group’s strength in renewable energy, especially off-shore renewables, relevant units should build strategies along with specific plans of action in this field, Vuong said.

Meanwhile, Director General Le Manh Hung stressed that the group must work hard to ensure sufficient supply of energy, especially petrol and gas, for the country in line with the Prime Minister’s requirement. He also directed the group to actively work with related agencies in building institutions, mechanisms and policies for the development of the oil and gas industry, particularly in the drafting of the revised law on oil and gas.

The Director General warned that the situation on the world market will worsen in the last months of 2022 and in 2023 as a consequence of instability, depression and shrinking production, which will affect PetroVietnam’s production and business.

He required the group’s units to closely monitoring trends on the market, develop scenarios for production and business depending on inflation and exchange rate as well as impacts of monetary and fiscal policies, and reshuffle investment portfolio to cope with the effect of inflation.

The group should build plans to cope with the risk of disruption in supply chains, roll out connectivity chains in production, business and investment, and promote long-term scientific research programmes, especially a research project on dioxide carbon, to serve investment planning and market expansion, Director General Hung said.