Hassan Tampuli (right), Vice-President Dr Bawumia and Dr Amin Adam
THE PETROLEUM downstream sector saw a 15% surge in the consumption of petroleum products from 3.4 million metric tonnes in 2017 to 3.9 million metric tonnes in 2018.
This was occasioned
by efforts invested into fighting illicit fuel activities.
The Chief
Executive Officer (CEO) of National Petroleum Authority, Hassan Tampuli, who disclosed
this at the ongoing 3rd edition of the Ghana International Petroleum
Conference (GhIPCon) 2019, said the petroleum sector contributed over GH¢86
billion to Ghana’s GDP representing an average of about 8% per annum in the
period 2013 to 2018.
These
successes, he explained, were achieved despite the many challenges the
petroleum industry faces. Some of the challenges he enumerated included
“smuggling via unapproved offshore routes; dumping of Gasoil declared for sale
to foreign vessels at local filling stations; under-declaration and
non-declaration of products lifted at depots; diversion of subsidized social
products such as premix fuel, as well as fraudulent freight claims from some
transporters and siphoning LPG from BRVS into surface tanks at illegal LPG
tank”.
These
“nefarious activities” he added, cost Ghana “about $200 million per annum of
tax revenue; compromising on product quality at filling stations due to
laundering which leads to damage to vehicle engines; and distortion of the
national consumption statistics (over 300,000Mt of actual annual consumption
was unreported).
He also said
that the “Unified Petroleum Price Fund (UPPF) also recorded about USD12million
losses per annum”.
Mr. Tampuli mentioned that the NPA had “rolled
out a series of measures to tackle the problem heads on, in collaboration with
the Ghana Revenue Authority, Ghana Navy and other relevant security agencies in
the country”, and intensified “digital solutions such as enterprise relational
database management software, petroleum products marking scheme and bulk road
vehicle tracking project”.
On his part,
Vice-President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia attributed the growth in the downstream
petroleum sector to government’s deregulation policy.
“The
investment has been championed by the private sector which is mostly dominated
by a growing number of indigenous Ghanaian companies.
“For
instance, over the past eight years, the industry has grown from a total of
eight (8) bulk distribution companies (BDCs) to 35. The number of oil marketing
companies (OMCs) has grown from eight one (81) to one hundred and fifteen
(115),” he said.
Dr. Bawumia
also mentioned that as of May 2019, there were 19 companies providing support
services for the sector in areas such as tank calibration, underground storage
tank (UST) and Above Storage Tank (AST) cleaning, Non-Destructive Testing
(NDT), among others.
Deputy
Minister of Energy Dr. Amin Adam said government through the Energy Ministry
and NPA was taking steps to focus on transforming the petroleum downstream
sector from its present state “towards government’s vision of making Ghana a
hub for refined petroleum products in the West Africa region.”
