Kandy, Sri Lanka – On a sunny March day in the hill city of Kandy in central Sri Lanka, Keerthi Rathna waited in a serpentine queue to buy his share of petrol for his three-wheeler tuk-tuk.The government-allocated ration for him was 20 litres (about 5 gallons) per week. In the past, Rathna used to buy as much petrol as he needed, whenever he needed it, but everything has changed since the United States and Israel launched their war on Iran on February 28.Iran responded by halting most traffic via the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20 percent of the world’s oil and gas passes.Sri Lanka imports 60 percent of its energy needs, much of it through the strait. It also has no storage capacity beyond one month’s consumption needs. With the passageway largely closed, the South Asian island nation of 22 million introduced a QR-based fuel ration arrangement, a system followed by the government during the economic crisis of Sri Lanka in 2022.Based on this per-week ration system, motorbikes are allowed eight litres of petrol, tuk-tuks 20 litres of petrol, cars 25 litres of petrol, buses 100 litres of diesel, and lorries with 200 litres of diesel.But even that limited fuel now comes at a higher cost: Sri Lanka has raised t …
