Consumers of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (cooking gas) will have to wait till next week before the prices of the product will normalise.
While product supply was restored last week following the discharge in Lagos of LPG from the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas Limited, circulation is still gathering momentum, albeit slowly, and prices of the commodity have remained high across the country.
The price of a 12.5-kilogramme cylinder of LPG, which last week was N5,000 in Lagos and Ogun states, however, dropped to N4,000 on Monday.
The National President, Liquefied Petroleum Gas Retailers Association of Nigeria, Mr. Michael Umudu, who spoke with our correspondent on Monday, confirmed that the retail price for a cylinder containing 12.5kg of cooking gas was still N4,000 in Lagos and Ogun states.
He said the same volume of the product was still selling for N5,000 in Benin because product circulation had yet to get to the state and the entire South-South and South-East regions.
Umudu, however, lamented that the current retail price was still a far cry from the N3,000 the same 12.5kg cylinder of gas sold for before the NLNG/ the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency crisis began.
He said, “I can confirm to you that the retail price as of today (Monday) is N4,000 in Lagos and Ogun. We sold 12.5kg cylinder of cooking gas at N5,000 last week. The product has not circulated, but the situation is getting better in Lagos and Ogun.
“The product has not reached Benin, the South-South and the South East, but we hope that the situation will improve by the weekend. What we are experiencing now is due to the scarcity caused by the NLNG/NIMASA face-off; so, it is not a planned increment. The increment is due to low circulation. The product is available but circulation is still low. Many LPG plants are yet to get their allocations from the product supplied.”
The President, Nigerian Association of LPG Marketers, Mr. Basil Ogbuanu, who spoke with our correspondent on the telephone on Monday, said most cooking gas plants were still selling a 12.5kg cylinder of LPG between N3,000 and N3,500.
This, he explained, was because of the increase in the depot price from N2.8m for 20,000 tonnes of cooking gas to N3.4m.
He said, “We bought 20,000 tonnes of cooking at N3.4m as against the N2.8m before the faceoff. The depots (off takers) said the price had gone up internationally. As such, they could not sell to us at the initial price.
“The product is available now, but it is still circulating. We expect that by this weekend, it would have been everywhere.”
The Treasurer, Nigeria LP Gas Association, Mr. Felix Ekundayo, who explained the reasons behind the rise in depot price, said international prices of gas had gone up, thus having effects on local price of the commodity.
He further explained that operators would have to recover some costs lost to the NLNG/NIMASA crisis.
The two factors, according to him, are responsible for the rise in the price of cooking gas at the depots.
Ekundayo, however, expressed optimism that the situation would improve as more volume of the product was supplied to the domestic market.
“The vessel supplying LPG to the domestic market just berthed in Lagos few days ago and it is expected that the situation will take some time before it normalises and LPG circulates nationwide,” he said.