Former state minister for information and broadcasting and Awami League central executive committee member Mohammad Ali Arafat has rejected criticism that the Awami League government made Bangladesh excessively dependent on imported energy, describing the allegation as “falsehood”.
Arafat argued that the government pursued two parallel approaches during Sheikh Hasina’s tenure: increasing domestic gas exploration and production while also developing infrastructure to import liquefied natural gas (LNG) to meet rising demand.
In a press statement, Arafat said that when Sheikh Hasina became prime minister in 2009, Bangladesh was producing around 1,744 million cubic feet of gas per day from domestic sources, while there was no imported gas at the time.
According to figures cited by Arafat, the government’s roughly 15 years and seven months in office saw substantial exploration and drilling activity aimed at increasing domestic gas supplies. He said around 155 wells were drilled and six new gas fields were discovered during the period.
He claimed these initiatives added a net production capacity of approximately 1,006 million cubic feet per day. As a result, domestic gas production rose to more than 2,750 million cubic feet per day around 2020, according to the figures presented by him.
The former minister said the government simultaneously took steps to establish capacity for importing around 1,000 million cubic feet of LNG per day. He maintained that the move was driven by the expanding economy, industrialisation and steadily increasing demand for natural gas.
Arafat said relying entirely on domestic production would not have been sufficient to meet future demand. Gas fields and individual wells do not maintain the same production level indefinitely. As reservoirs mature and extraction continues over time, output from older fields can naturally decline. Consequently, even when new wells are drilled and new fields are brought into production, falling output from older sources can affect the overall supply position.
He also pointed to the lengthy nature of oil and gas exploration. Discovering a new field does not immediately translate into commercial production, as exploration, appraisal, development and related infrastructure can take considerable time. Such activities also involve significant investment and carry inherent uncertainty.
Against this backdrop, Arafat said LNG imports were pursued as a means of addressing supply gaps while domestic exploration continued. He argued that ensuring a reliable gas supply was necessary for industrial activity and broader economic operations, making advance preparation for LNG imports a practical requirement from the government’s perspective.
The development of LNG infrastructure, he said, also involved considerably more specialised arrangements than ordinary fuel imports. LNG must be received, stored and converted back into gaseous form before it can be supplied through the gas network. This requires specialised terminals and associated infrastructure, which cannot be established overnight.
Arafat therefore maintained that preparing LNG import facilities ahead of a potential supply shortage was necessary when considering Bangladesh’s future energy requirements. He argued that without such infrastructure, subsequent gas shortages could have become even more severe.
His comments came in response to allegations that the Awami League government turned Bangladesh into an energy-import-dependent country. Arafat rejected that characterisation, arguing that the government had simultaneously attempted to expand domestic gas production and create an import option for meeting additional demand.
He said the presence of LNG imports alone should not be used to determine whether Bangladesh became dependent on imported energy. In his view, such an assessment needs to consider the wider supply-demand balance, including domestic gas production, declining output from older fields, newly drilled wells, newly discovered fields and the infrastructure developed for LNG imports.
The debate over Bangladesh’s gas supply has broader implications because natural gas has long been an important component of the country’s electricity generation, industrial production and commercial activity. Any sustained gap between demand and domestic supply can therefore affect industries and other gas-dependent sectors.
Arafat’s argument is that the government’s energy strategy should be assessed against this wider context rather than by looking solely at the decision to import LNG. His defence rests on the claim that domestic exploration and production were expanded while imported gas was introduced to address the additional requirements created by economic growth and declining output from mature gas fields.
He ultimately maintained that describing the Awami League government as having simply pursued an import-dependent energy policy does not reflect the full picture of its gas exploration, production and supply strategy.
