Nigeria Cooking-Gas Usage Hit 78,000 Metric Tonnes

Nigeria cooking-gas usage hit a 78 metric tonnes peak for the month of July, the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) has said.

Known as the Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), the PPPRA noted that its utilisation f rose from 40,000 Metric Tonnes (MT) in April to 78,000 metric tonnes in July.

In a report by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the Executive Secretary of PPPRA, Mr Abdulkadir Saidu revealed this in a statement made available to newsmen in Abuja recently and explained that the rise was a reflection of the combined efforts of government, industry operators and regulators in deepening LPG penetration.

Saidu was optimistic that the volume of cooking gas consumed locally would further rise in the months ahead, as various initiatives taken by the government and investors to deepen LPG penetration began to yield fruit.

“While domestic utilisation ranged between 40,000 MT and 54,000 MT from January to April 2018, the July 2019 monthly utilisation hit 78,000 MT.

“This figure is expected to increase in the months ahead, as some of the government and industry initiatives take root.

“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.

“The rapid growth in LPG utilisation is in fulfilment of the vision of the government to deepen LPG utilisation in the country, as encapsulated in the 2017 National Gas Policy,” he said

Saidu 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 the 5 million MT cumulative target by 2022.

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