Dr Mustapha Abdul-Hamid
Chief Executive of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), Dr Mustapha Abdul-Hamid says the number of people using Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) domestically have shoot up now compare to previous years.
According to him, the numbers have increased more than 12 percent than couple of years back.
Giving figures to back his claim, he indicated that using LPG as main source of cooking fuel rose from 24.5 per cent in 2017 to 36.9 per cent in 2021.
This he attributed to the increase in adoption rate of gas as main source of cooking fuel as a result of regulatory interventions focused on rural LPG promotions to distribute free cylinders, intensified public educations on safe usage of LPG, infrastructural development, improvement in supply and distribution and LPG pricing structure.
Speaking at the 3rd West Africa LPG Conference and Expo under the theme “Towards Making LPG The Clean Fuel of West Africa”, the NPA Boss said the objective of government is to ensure at least 50 per cent penetration by 2050.
Dr Abdul-Hamid said even though Ghana had made gains in LPG consumption over the past five years, there were challenges which have threatened the sustainability of the LPG market in Ghana
“… challenges such as slow uptake in particularly low-income areas, affordability, accessibility, non-adherence to safety requirements by some operators, old and unsafe cylinders, among others have threatened the sustainability of the LPG market in Ghana,
“To remedy the situation, the government of Ghana in October 2017 launched the National LPG Promotion Policy with the objective of ensuring that at least 50 per cent of Ghanaians have access to LPG for domestic, commercial, and industrial use by 2030. The Policy is to be driven by the new marketing and distribution model, the Cylinder Recirculation Model (CRM),” he emphasized
On his part, the Minister of Energy, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh said the LPG industry presents an attractive solution to leverage the shift to cleaner energy sources while promoting Africa’s industrialization agenda.
“And I believe it will take the collective efforts from academia, the industry and government to prudently push West Africa to maximize the economic gains across the entire LPG value chain,” he added.
By Vincent Kubi