JOHANNESBURG, Dec. 14 (Xinhuanet) -- The crisis around the fuel shortage has peaked with a panic buying on the part of motorists and other consumers in South Africa, the petroleum industry said on Wednesday.

    "Plans are in place, which leads us all to believe that we are over the peak of the problem and now coming down the other side ofthe mountain towards a normal situation," SA Petroleum Industry Association (SAPIA) chairman Philip Jordan assured the Parliament.

    However, he said it was important that the current spate of panic buying by the public ends to help the situation normalize.

    Turning to the reasons for the shortage, Jordan agreed with South African Minerals and Energy Minister Lindiwe Hendricks that the industry had concurred with the department a long time ago (2001) on what had to be done in terms of clean fuels from January 1.

    It should be appreciated that these were big investment projects in the refineries with long lead times, which had been planned some time ago.

    However, some of the shutdowns lasted longer than planned, resulting in the contingency stocks being used up, and "that's where we found ourselves in a short-stock situation".

    "What we have is a situation where from a production point of view the country's refineries are working well," he said.

    Demand so far this month had been running at about 20 percent more on a daily average basis compared to November.

    Hendricks said she had invoked statutory powers to obtain information on the exact status of fuel supplies held in the country by petroleum companies to fully understand the nature of the shortage so that state infrastructure and logistics could be used if necessary to resolve the backlog.

    She also raised the possibility of further regulation of the industry in the interests of public concern.

    Hendricks said this had been discussed with the industry, whichhad offered its full cooperation in the investigation. Enditem