Fuel prices up

Page 3 Feb. 21/2008

Story: Charles Benoni Okine

THERE have been an upward adjustment in the prices of all the five major petroleum products in the country with effect from last Saturday, February 16, 2008 to reflect the soaring prices of crude oil on the international market.
From 102Gp per litre, premium petrol is now selling at 104Gp per litre, while gas oil, which was 101.6Gp, has shot up to 104Gp per litre.
Kerosene, which was 92.05Gp per litre at the beginning of the month, has also gone up to 94.30Gp per litre.
The price for premix, the fuel used by the fisherfolk, which also stood at 70.2Gp per litre, has gone up marginally and is now selling at 71.70Gp per litre.
As per the new price adjustment regime adopted by the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), in conjunction with the oil marketing companies (OMCs), the prices of the products are to move up and down depending on the price of crude oil on the international market.
On Monday, the price of crude oil rose above $96 a barrel, surging to a one-month high as investors fixated on the possibility — however slim — of OPEC member Venezuela halting supplies to the top consumer, the United States.
US crude was up 45 cents at $95.91, after earlier hitting $96.05. London Brent crude rose 25 cents to $95.41.
The South American country, one of the largest crude exporters to the US, cut shipments to Exxon Mobil earlier this week after the US oil major won court orders to freeze over $12 billion of Venezuela's assets.
Major oil producers in the Middle East have already assured the US that they could compensate for a supply disruption if Venezuela slowed exports.
Supply worries also eased as Mexico re-opened all three of its main oil exporting ports on Thursday, a day after they had been closed because of bad weather in the Gulf of Mexico.
The market continued to fret over slowing US oil demand as economic woes lingered.
The fixing of fuel prices in the country has been deregulated to enable market forces to dictate the prices on the market.
The move has freed the government from the burden of having to heavily subsidise the product, a regime which nearly crippled the economy in 2000.