Getting around Pakistan got 7.9% cheaper since May, Mobility Index shows

Getting around Pakistan cost less in September than it did in May. A new Mobility Index, put together by Pakistan & Counting with ride-sharing operator BusCaro, puts the average cost of a kilometre at Rs9.65 in September, down from Rs10.48 in May. The index itself fell from 100 to 92.1 over those four months — a drop of 7.9%.

Cheaper petrol did most of the work. The index uses a weighted average petrol price of Rs374.61 a litre in September, 7.5% below May’s Rs405.19. That matters so much because Pakistan travels mostly on its own vehicles: of the 36.7 million vehicles the index counts, 30.3 million are motorcycles and 5.1 million are cars. When the pump price falls, the cost of the daily commute falls with it, almost in lockstep.

The savings look small per kilometre and add up over a month. Running a Honda CD70, the country’s most common motorcycle, fell from Rs7.37 a kilometre to Rs6.81. A petrol car went from Rs26.80 to Rs24.78 a kilometre, and a private rickshaw from Rs12.66 to Rs11.71. A 20-kilometre daily commute, at the average rate, works out roughly Rs16.60 a day cheaper than it was in May.

Ride-hailing fell further than fuel

The index tracks eight ways of travelling: your own bike, private rickshaw and car, public transport per seat, ride-share per seat, and ride-hailing bike, rickshaw and car. App fares dropped further than fuel did. A 20-kilometre car ride cost 23% less than in May, a bike ride 18.3% less and a rickshaw ride 11.7% less.

One reading needs care

The headline number is weighted by vehicles on the road, so privately owned bikes, cars and rickshaws — priced on fuel alone — carry 98.7% of the weight. Ride-hailing, ride-sharing and public transport together account for just over 1%. Public transport also moved the other way in the comparison, but for a special reason: all four of Punjab’s BRT services were free from early April until June 12, so May effectively recorded no fare for them.

Even with that caveat, the arithmetic is plain enough for anyone who commutes. Every Rs10 on a litre of petrol adds 18 paisa to each kilometre on a CD70, 31 paisa on a rickshaw and 66 paisa on the average car. Petrol came down, and so did the road.