Short- and long-run elasticities of gasoline demand in India: An empirical analysis using cointegration techniques

Abstract

In developing countries like India, consumption of petroleum products has implications on its balance of payments, economic growth and fiscal deficit. Gasoline is one of the prime petroleum products. In this paper, the relationship between gasoline demand, national income and price of gasoline is empirically examined using cointegration and error correction techniques. The time frame of the analysis is from 1972–1973 to 1993–1994. It has been found that gasoline demand is likely to increase significantly for a given increase in the gross domestic product. The increase will be larger in the long-run (2.682) than in the short-run (1.178). Gasoline demand is relatively inelastic to price changes, both in the long and short terms. The error correction model has shown that gasoline demand adjusts to their respective long-run equilibrium at a relatively slow rate, with about 28% of adjustment taking place in the first year.