PPPRA: Nigerians Increasingly Switching from Kerosene to LPG

Chineme Okafor in Abuja
The Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) has disclosed that Nigerians are increasingly moving away from using household kerosene for domestic chores such as cooking to Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) or cooking gas.

It said in a statement from its Executive Secretary, Mr. Abdulkadir Saidu, that it observed a steady increase in LPG utilisation in the country, adding that while domestic utilisation of LPG ranged between 40,000 metric tons (MT) and 54,000MT from January to April 2018, July 2019 monthly utilisation however rose to 78,000MT.

Saidu stated: “It is gratifying to note that the efforts of government, industry operators and regulators in deepening LPG penetration is paying off as the nation continues to record rapid growth in the utilisation of LPG in the country.”

According to him, the new LPG utilisation figure was expected equally to increase in the months ahead as some of government and industry initiatives take root.

He further stated: “Correspondingly, there has been a steady decrease in kerosene utilisation within the same period indicating that Nigerians are increasingly finding value in the switch to LPG from household kerosene for cooking and other domestic purposes.”

He explained that the rapid growth in LPG utilisation was in fulfillment of the vision of the government on deepening LPG utilisation in the country as encapsulated in the National Gas Policy 2017.

Saidu, thus assured Nigerians that government, regulators, operators and other stakeholders would remain focused on the formulation and implementation of a stream of policies that would see to the actualisation of a five million metric tons cumulative usage target by the 2022.