UPDATE 1-Iran not planning to import gasoline this fiscal-NIOC

"Iran is not planning to import petrol and diesel in its current financial year as it has stepped up gas usage," Seyed Mohsen Ghamsari, executive director for international affairs at NIOC, told reporters here.

He said Iran's current gas output is 650 million cubic metres a day.

Iran, the world's fifth-biggest crude oil exporter, had long depended on imported gasoline for 30-40 percent of its consumption.

But after Western sanctions were tightened last year to make it harder for Iran to find gasoline suppliers -- targeting Tehran's chronic lack of refining capacity -- the Islamic Republic made an emergency push to increase its own gasoline production, including converting petrochemical plants to make the fuel.

Various Iranian officials have said in recent months that Iran is now self-sufficient in gasoline and has even started exporting it, but many external energy market experts have dismissed the claim that it has made up for the imports.

Iran's latest refinery project -- an expansion of its 100-year-old Abadan plant -- suffered a fatal explosion and fire last week when it was being inaugurated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Some politicians have said the new plant was rushed on stream too quickly. [ID:nLDE74N04S]

The latest figures on the Oil Ministry's website show Iranians' consumption of gasoline averages around 60 million litres a day, recovering from a drop to 53 million in December after price subsidies were reduced, causing huge rise in fuel prices