BEIJING, March 6 (Xinhuanet) -- China is expected to import 120 million tons of oil, including more than 90 million tons of crude oil, to fuel high GDP growth this year, with the nation's dependence on the world oil market bound to aggravate.

    Official statistics show that in 2003, net oil imports by Chinaamounted to 97.39 million tons, including 82.99 million tons of crude oil, up 30 percent or so over the previous-year level.

    The proportion of overseas crude oil processed by refineries nationwide went up from 28 percent in 2002 to 34 percent last year,according to the statistics.

    The mounting reliance on imports is attributed by experts from China Petroleum Group to a limited domestic crude oil production and a substantial increase in demand.

    China produced 169.319 million tons of crude oil in 2003, a timid growth of 1.5 percent over 2002. And the growth rate slowed by one percentage point from the previous year.

    Last year the country's oil demand was shored up mainly by the combination of a 9.1-percent economic growth, oil-firing power generating as against a backdrop of electricity shortage in the eastern and southern parts of China and a significant increment incar population, according to Tian Chunrong, a senior engineer withthe nation's another oil mogul China Petrochemical Group (Sinopec).

    Since last September, China's daily oil consumption has averaged at 5.36 million barrels, outdoing Japan to become the world's second biggest oil consumer, next only to the United States.

    Domestic demand for oil is forecast at 290 million tons this year, a year-on-year growth of some 6.5 percent.

    On the basis of a per-capita exploitable oil reserves of 2.6 tons (data as of 2000), or 11.1 percent of the world average, China will incur a gradually decline of oil production since 2020,when the output hits 180 to 200 million tons, the experts predict.They also foresee a domestic demand of 450 to 600 million tons forthe year, which implies that the nation's dependence on the world oil market will go up to some 60 percent.

    To ensure the security of its strategic energy resources, China has decided to build four oil storage bases at an estimated cost of 6 billion yuan (722.9 million US dollars).

    China became a net importer of oil in 1993. Enditem