The Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency, PPPRA, has given oil marketers the go-ahead to source foreign exchange, forex, to import petrol into the country at an autonomous exchange rate of N298 to the dollar.
As a way of limiting the challenges associated with sourcing and accessing forex for the importation of petrol by the oil marketers, reliable sources in the agency disclosed that forex was pegged at N298 to the dollar. The agency had released a revised pricing template for petrol on Wednesday night.
The sources explained that while the government’s official naira/dollar exchange rate through the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, window remains at N199 to the dollar, the decision to adopt a parallel market rate for petrol importation was agreed by all stakeholders in the downstream oil sector during the consultations.
They stated that before arriving at the new pricing template, a comprehensive study of the cost of importation was undertaken and all stakeholders, including oil marketers and independent experts, were consulted to arrive at an appropriate cost reflective regime.
The template, which put the landing cost of petrol at N119.74 per litre and distribution margins as N18.37, meant that the total cost-to-pump price for a litre of petrol rose to N138.11.
It however indicated that marketers could sell petrol within a retail price band of N135 to N145 per litre.
