State works on uniform fuel price modality
DODOMA: THE government through the Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority (EWURA) is carrying out an assessment that may help to come up with a modality of having a uniform price for petroleum products across the country.
Deputy Minister for Energy, Ms Judith Kapinga revealed the good news in Parliament yesterday when responding to a question by Arusha Urban CCM MP Mrisho Gambo.
In his basic question, the legislator wanted to know if the government had any plan of coming up with a strategy that could help EWURA to issue uniform fuel prices in its monthly price cap reports.
According to Ms Kapinga, the arrangement was applicable in previous years but was disbanded after it faced several obstacles. She said some obstacles were related to policy and supervision.
“After the system was disbanded, oil dealers were then allowed to set their own prices for the petroleum products depending on the market forces,” she said.
She said upon completion of the assessment, the government will satisfy itself whether the new system will be productive, including looking at its convenience in terms of supervision to ensure challenges that emerged in previous years don’t recur,” she said.
According to Ms Kapinga, Deputy Prime Minister Dr Doto Biteko called for carrying out the assessment, adding that she hoped the exercise will soon be completed.
Ms Gambo, in his supplementary question, wanted to be informed whether the assessment would be completed, and how the government was prepared to deal with challenges that occurred in previous years.
The deputy minister said the findings of the assessment will also help to propose ways to deal with the obstacles that occurred in previous years.
Understandably, distance from fuel importation points to the location of consumers contributes to variation in prices.
On Mainland Tanzania, fuel importation points are Dar es Salaam, Tanga and Mtwara ports, meaning that consumers in the periphery are likely to be affected in terms of pricing.
