ISLAMABAD: Because of exchange rate gains over the past month, the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) on Friday slightly reduced the price of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).

Both local and imported LPG rate was reduced by 81 paise per kg, bringing the cost of 11.8kg domestic cylinder down by Rs9.51 or 0.31pc for March.

In a notification, Ogra set the price of LPG at Rs215.49 per kg for March instead of Rs216.30 per kg in February. As such, the price of 11.8kg domestic cylinder was set at Rs2,542.78 against Rs2,552.30 last month. The cylinder price has gone up from Rs2,322 since June last year.

On the other hand, the price of a commercial cylinder (45.4kg) was reduced by Rs36 to Rs9,783.24 against Rs9,820 in February. Its price has gone up from Rs8,939 since June last year.

The regulator had historically been determining the local pricing because of very limited imports of about 20pc. The traders and LPG dealers, however, started charging the prices of both products at higher rates by deceiving the consumers that they were supplying imported products because of the non-availability of local gas. As a consequence, Ogra was given the power in May last year to also fix the uniform rate for local and imported LPG.

Now that the situation had changed drastically with a share of imports increasing to almost 50pc, Ogra had ad now started determining the same price for both local and imported products as it could not be differentiated in the market if the consumers get local or imported LPG.

Therefore, it had “notified the maximum price of indigenous LPG which shall be regulated at the maximum price at all levels of the supply chain for indigenous as well as imported LPG”.

Published in Dawn, March 2nd, 2024