NMDPRA says Dangote Refinery has Promised to Publish Aviation Fuel Price Daily

The Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) says Dangote Petroleum Refinery will publish aviation fuel prices.

During an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday, George Ene-Ita, the regulator’s director of public affairs, said the decision to publish the aviation fuel prices will strengthen compliance and ease cost pressures in the aviation sector.

Ene-Ita said although petroleum product prices have been deregulated, the refinery’s price disclosure will support the regulator’s monitoring efforts.

“However, with particular emphasis on ATK, the Dangote refinery having released its latest indicative gantry prices, which they promised to publish daily going forward, will enable us ensure tacit compliance by marketers and operators during our routine surveillance operations nationwide,” he said.

Ene-Ita said the refinery’s plan to publish indicative prices daily will help the regulator track compliance during nationwide surveillance.

“We are not unmindful of the fact that what the Dangote Refinery is doing is a concession to help ease overhead cost pressures in the aviation sector in order not to truncate its operations,” he said.

The regulator added that its pricing benchmarks are based on Platts averages recorded between April 17 and 23, noting that prices may still fluctuate due to global oil market volatility, including geopolitical tensions such as the U.S.–Iran situation.

On April 14, the Nigerian airline operators threatened to suspend operations from April 20 over the rising cost of aviation fuel — the planned suspension was later halted.

The operators said the price of aviation fuel, also known as Jet A1, has increased from N900 per litre as of February 28 to N3,300 per litre — representing a rise of over 300 percent.

Although, on April 27, a federal government committee, consisting NMDPRA, Nigerian airline operators and oil marketers, said the indicative end-user price for aviation fuel should range between N1,760 – N1,988 per litre and N1,809 – N2,037 per litre in Lagos and Abuja, respectively.

The committee said the price range are based on Platts average prices for the period between April 17 and 23, adding that products purchased outside this window may be higher due to high volatility in current prices precipitated by the United States, Israel and Iran war and varying operational costs by operators.

However, according to NAN, Dangote refinery recently fixed its ex-gantry price for aviation fuel at N1,820 per litre.