Indian Oil's retail plans in Indonesia put on hold

New Delhi: Indian Oil Corporation has decided to puts its petroleum retailing plans in Indonesia on hold. However, the company may continue with its lubricant distribution business in Indonesia.

IndianOil was looking at launching its retail outlets in Indonesia by floating a fully owned subsidiary. If the plans had materialised this would have been IndianOil's third retailing venture abroad. IndianOil entered the Sri Lankan market in 2002 through Lanka IOC. The Indian petroleum marketing major also has a presence in Mauritius through its subsidiary IndianOil Mauritius.

Currently, Indonesia-the leading petroleum market in the ASEAN region - is estimated to have 50 million tonne per annum of petroleum products. For tapping the opportunities in Indonesian petroleum retailing industry, IndianOil had also taken its board's approval to set up a fully owned subsidiary. Besides auto fuels, the Indonesian venture was to retail lubricants.

The Indonesian Government owns 70 per cent stake in the petrochemical company.