The Department of Petroleum Resources has called for improved awareness on the use of Liquefied Petroleum Gas to boost its consumption in line with Federal Government’s aspirations.
Asuquo Antai, the Operations Controller, DPR, Warri Zonal Office, made the call on Friday at the 2018 DPR/LPG Marketers Stakeholders Forum in Warri, Delta, with the theme: “Stakeholders Relationship Building and Management: Promoting a Safe and Sustainable Utilisation of LPG”.
Antai, who was represented by Nicholas Ogbe, the Manager, Upstream, DPR, said a lot of people do not use the cooking fuel because of the fear of the high risk associated with its usage.
According to him, it is easier and safer to harbour gas than electricity which virtually about 80 per cent of Nigerians comfortable with.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that in spite of the huge gas deposit in the country, the consumption rate of LPG is currently about 600 tonnes per annum and the per capita is about 2KG.
The DPR controller said the figure was quite low when compared to other African countries like Ghana with 4.3KG and Sierra Leone with about 9KG per capital in LPG consumption.
He said: “The Nigerian Bureau of Statistic says about 66 per cent of Nigerian population still rely on the use of firewood.”
He added that the theme for this year’s forum was chosen in line with Federal Government aspiration to grow LPG investment and gas domestication in the country.
Antai said: “As a domestic cooking fuel, LPG presents valuable opportunity to combating climate change, reduced deforestation and improved community health, economy and livelihood.
“LPG has a relatively low emission when compared to other means of cooking like kerosene, firewood and others.”
Antai noted that despite the huge natural gas reserved in the country, and the various interventions by the Federal Government in the LPG sector, the use of cooking gas has not been fully realised.
He added that every stakeholder, producers, depot owners, operators and retailers had become very important to achieving the government aspiration of growing the product usage which would eventually translate into growing business.
He said growing the LPG business would result in job creation, economic stability and growth.
The controller, however, assured the LPG operators of the regulatory agency’s commitment to engaging all stakeholders with a view to promoting the efficiency and security of supply of the product in the country.
He advised the operators to adhere strictly to the Standard Operating Procedures of the regulatory agency, adding that all licenses without certified SOP would be rejected.
However, some of the stakeholders called for the removal of bottleneck in license renewal and also create the enabling environment to encourage the ease of doing the business.
