China crude oil production in January and February was up by 1.9% on an annual basis.

Official data released on Monday showed that China's crude oil output in January and February rose by 1.9% when compared with the same period of last year. This was largely due to higher refinery operating rates.

National Bureau of Statistics of China data showed that the total refinery throughput of the second largest oil consumer in the world was 122.63 millions metric tons or approximately 15.17 million barrels a day.

China releases a single release of data for both January and February to reduce the impact of Lunar New Year holidays that fall during either of these months every year.

According to Oilchem, the capacity utilization rate of refineries was 71.3% for January and 73.2% for February, both higher than during the previous period.

According to Oilchem, in February, gasoline consumption increased as long-distance traveling during the Spring Festival grew. Meanwhile, production remained medium-to high and inventories decreased along the midstream and downstream supply chains.

Oilchem said that the February diesel production saw only limited reductions, while consumption dropped to its lowest level in the entire year due to a slowdown in industrial activity and logistics. This led?to an increase in domestic inventories.

According to Oilchem, fuel?oil?production grew by 4% from January to February.

The data from the?statistics office also revealed that domestic crude oil production in January-February rose by 1.9% on an annual basis to 35.73 millions tons or 4.42 million bpd.

Natural gas production?was up by 2.9% from January to February compared with the same period last year, reaching 44.6 billion cubic meters.

(source: Reuters)