Soaring LPG prices force rickshaw drivers in Pakistan to cut meals

For 13 years, Rashid Ali has driven a three-wheeled motorised rickshaw around Lahore. His day starts at 6am and sometimes does not end until midnight, but he was long able to make around Rs1,700 ($6. 50) a day, enough for his family’s bare essentials. Now, with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) prices surging, he doesn’t even make half that. Ali, 33, is among thousands of drivers who run their vehicles on LPG, which is sold in cylinders and mainly used for cooking and heating. Rashid Ali waits for customers while offering rides in his liquefied petroleum gas (LPG)-powered auto-rickshaw along a road in Lahore, on October 30, 2026.

— Reuters Majeed Ghauri, Chairman of the Awami Rickshaw Union, calls it “the fuel of the poor” and says about 70 per cent of its members’ 43,000 auto-rickshaws and nearly 8,000 Qingqi motorcycle-based three-wheelers, which carry several passengers on set routes, run on LPG. LPG prices have surged since October 17, when two Iranian border crossings closed , halting imports, traders say, in the latest energy shock since the US-Iran war began in February. One of the border crossings was opened a week later. With Ali now lucky to make around Rs800 ($3) a day, his family has cut back on meals, eating only twice a day. “Previously, when LPG was cheap, we could earn a decent income,” Ali said. “Now, it’s just not possible to get by on Rs700 or Rs800, is it? ” A man fills a cylinder with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) at his shop in Lahore on October 30, 2026. — Reuters Before the border closures, Pakistan imported about 7,000 metric tonnes of LPG a day from Iran, the Pakistan LPG Association said. Traders said the price of a 12-kilogramme cylinder jumped 56pc within days of the closure to Rs7,000, or about Rs583 rupees per kg in the open market. Walking…