Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Do we need to panic about fuel supplies?

Now look, I don’t think there’s any reason to panic, but if you’ve been reading the news closely - and especially if you’ve been reading more widely than just the New Zealand news - you’re probably starting to feel a little nervous about what might happen to fuel supplies here and the possibility that we may have to start rationing.

The Strait of Hormuz is still effectively shut. The Iranians have now attacked 13 tankers. The boss of the Saudi-backed oil company has warned this could be catastrophic for the world’s economy if that strait isn’t opened relatively soon.

South Korea has floated the possibility of banning fuel exports. That’s a problem for us - it’s where we get roughly half of our fuel.

Parts of rural Western Australia have already run out of diesel because the townies are buying so much of it. They’re panicking. We have around 50 days’ worth of fuel in this country. Half of that, though, is on the water - and ships can be and have been diverted - so you can only really lock in about half of what we’ve got.

The Minister is now taking advice on how to manage demand, meaning how to get us to use less. One of the ideas he’s considering is the return of carless days.

There are normally very level‑headed people now warning us that we should at least start mentally preparing for the possibility that we may have to ration the fuel we use.

Now, rationing sounds bad. It sounds like something from World War II. But it might not be that bad. It may not be carless days all over again - although that does feel like a significant escalation of the situation. And of course this whole thing might blow over tomorrow.

In fact, Donald Trump is likely to call the attacks off the minute they start having really significant negative impacts on oil supply and world economies because he is so fixated on global markets and making money. The moment he cannot talk markets back into a good place is the moment I think he starts to call it off.

But the thing is, it’s already having an impact, isn’t it? It will already be wiping money off our GDP. And the longer it goes on, the more it takes out of GDP.

Now, I’m thinking this is not going to end in the worst-case scenario the Minister is preparing for. I don’t know whether that’s my wishful or my rational brain talking but as they say - hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

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