China delays strategic oil reserves storage

Completion of China’s strategic oil reserves has been pushed back to beyond the original 2020 deadline.
According to Bloomberg, China will finish construction of the second phase of its strategic stockpiles and will begin preliminary work on additional sites by 2020, according to the 2016-2020 Five Year Plan.
Previously, the plans stipulated that the three phases would be completed by the end of 2020.
Bloomberg reports that the country increased imports by 8.8% to a record 6.7 million barrels a day in 2015 as oil prices dropped to the lowest annual price in more than 10 years.
The first phase of China’s storage build was completed in 2009, comprising four sites totalling 91 million barrels. The second phase, comprising 168 million barrels, has been delayed, but was due to be completed in 2015.