The Institute for Energy Security (IES) has predicted a further drop of fuel prices by about 2% in the 1st pricing window of April.
The Institute believes the drop could be attributed to the removal of Excise Levy and the review of the Special Petroleum tax which has been moved from 17.5% to 15% by the government.
Checks by Citi Business News also reveal that some Oil Marketing Companies have reduced their fuel prices.
Goil for instance has reduced both petrol and diesel by 5 pesewas per litre.
In an interview with Citi Business News, Principal Research Analyst at IES, Richmond Rockson said they are confident the reduction will soon reflect in the prices of the various OMC’s.
“There are very favorable conditions. When you look at the cedi to dollar exchange rate; the cedi has been doing relatively well as compared to the previous window. The cedi as at the time we put the statement together was 4 cedis, 33 pesewas, on an average from the previous average of 4 cedis, 52 pesewas.”
“When you also look at prices of crude oil it has gone down on the world market from a previous average of 53.5 dollars per barrel to 51.5 dollars per barrel. When you look at prices for finished products for both diesel and petrol and gasoline, they also dropped by 5.90%. Therefore we can predict confidently that this time round prices are going to fall again.” he stated.
The IES earlier predicted at least a 3% fall in fuel prices for the second pricing window in March.
They then based the fall on the drop in prices of petroleum products on the world market as well as the relative stability in the forex exchange market.
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By: Jessica Ayorkor Aryee/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana.
