Some Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) have started increasing prices of petroleum products at the pumps, beginning today, September 2, 2022.

Market leaders, GOIL and Total Energies are selling a litre of petrol at ¢11.55 pesewas and diesel at ¢14.50 respectively.

Joy Business checks, however, revealed that the increase is far higher than what had been projected, based on numbers from the Association of Oil Marketing Companies released earlier this week.

The increase in the prices of petroleum products by GOIL and Total Energies indicate that petrol has gone up by about 3% per litre, whilst diesel has shot up by 7%.

More OMCs are expected to follow suit in the coming days. by adjusting their prices upwards.

The increase in the prices of petroleum products is largely due to the sharp depreciation of the cedi to the dollar in the last two weeks. The Institute for Energy Security puts the depreciation of the cedi at over 10% during the last two weeks.

During the period, the International Benchmark saw a 1.68% price reduction over the previous pricing window’s average price to a current average price of $96.72 per barrel from $98.38 per barrel in the previous pricing window.

It further pointed out that “whereas the price of petrol has fallen by 5.87% and that of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) by 3.28% on the world market, the Institute of Energy Security (IES) projects that prices of these products would rise at the pumps. For diesel, the 6.48% increase in price will further increase the rate of price jump in September (2022)”.

Prices went up by 20 pesewas on August 16, 2022

During the last pricing window ending August 31, 2022, prices of fuel rose marginally.