Fuel smuggling remains a...

market prices. Venezuela, he said, has gone through a complete reversal from having fuel being smuggled out of their country to fuel now being smuggled into the country due to the tremendous shortages caused by dysfunctional refineries.

He noted that the Biometric marker on fuel came at a cost which GEA charged to the oil companies and they in turn factored this into their selling price at the gas stations.

However, the GEA said that this cost is minuscule at present at only G$0.60 per litre for large fuel importers. “Today’s (Nov. 18, 2020) price for gasoline at Guyoil is G$155 per litre. The marking fee represents 0.39% of the cost per litre,” Sharma stated.

“The point should be emphasized that the intent of smugglers is to avoid payment of local taxes. The fuel marking programme utilizes forensic technology to identify taxed and untaxed fuels,” the energy agency head said while noting that the record of the GEA has shown that with the advent of the marking programme the ‘percentage of sites found with significant dilution in at least one tank’ has been reduced from 34% in 2006 to less than 1% in 2019.

It was pointed out that, among other things, the biometric marking is a plus for the sector as estimates have shown that taxes collected from legitimate imports will move from over US$40M in 2021 to nearly US$60M by 2025.

In addition it stated that the marking ensures that the fuel imported is of an appropriate quality as in many cases “smuggled fuel is notorious for being of low and substandard quality. This causes more harmful emissions.”

With low quality fuel off the market, damage to machinery and equipment can be averted resulting in optimum use of fuel, the GEA head explained further.

Sharma said that the marking programme provides direct employment to over 50 employees of the GEA.