16 May 2012
| Let There Be Light |
|
An unstable political situation, violence, and foreign sanctions all had a domino effect on raising demand for electricity, diesel and gas. By Muhammad Atef Fares
After spending a week cooking over a fireplace, Abu Monzer, a 28-year-old mason and sculptor living in Zabadani, waited for almost ten hours to get a cooking gas canister. "This is my new job, waiting for hours to get cooking gas," he said. Prices pose another problem. Officially a 15 kg canister of gas costs SYP 250 (USD 4.6) from state distributers and SYP 275 (USD 5) from private ones. However, in practice, many Syrians are forced to pay between SYP350 (USD 6.4) to SYP 1,000 (USD 18), as many distributers take advantage of the fact that demand for gas is considerably higher than the available supply. When it comes to diesel, which is used to heat most Syrian houses, the situation is no better. Every winter, Syrians buy and store diesel in 200 to 1000 litre containers. But this year, purchasing diesel is challenging. In mid-November, Ahmad, a 38-year-old Damascus-based freelance photographer, applied for 300 litres of diesel at a privately-owned gas station in Damascus. "You are welcome," the station manager said. "You will receive it on January 14, 2012." "I need someone with authority to help me," Ahmad exclaimed, adding, "I do not know what families with kids do. Nowadays, for families with babies, that would be a disaster." Normally gas stations get diesel fuel from governmental suppliers and then resell it for SYP 15 (USD 0.27) per litre. Abu Monzer told Syria Today that "the distribution allows for favouritism and corruption. It is easy for distributers to say 'sorry, we ran out of diesel'." Diesel is also sold on the black market for SYP 25 (USD 0.45) to 35 per litre (USD 0.64). On December 18, the privately-owned economic weekly newspaper Al-Iqtissadiya reported that about 7000 citizens work selling diesel on the black market.
Whom to blame? Allaw also explained that last October and November, the monthly demand for diesel in some governorates increased by 40 percent from the previous year, and that distribution in October was 15 percent higher than it was the year before. The minister also claims that diesel and gas are available, and that the fuel deficit stems from distribution issues and citizens' unjust hoarding of these resources. Some analysts disagreed. "The diesel crisis is not about distribution," said Ziad Ayoub Arbache, an advisor and lecturer on energy economics at Damascus University. "There is in fact a problem with managing the crisis which is the seasonal increase in demand for diesel and cooking gas." Others attribute responsibility for the shortage either to officials in charge of distribution, select security members, or the extensive use of army and government vehicles that run on diesel, such as buses, personnel carriers and tanks. Some activists accuse the government of fabricating the gas crisis as a collective punishment to exhaust protestors and preoccupy them with daily needs. Many amateur videos have been posted on the Internet showing people's daily wait in front of gas stations, along with photos, cartoons, and slogans such as: "My children need diesel more than a tank does."
Snowball effect Recently, however, the growing diesel scarcity pushed many citizens to use electricity for heating. Some steal electricity through illegal power lines. On December 25, Al-Iqtissadiya reported that this had led to a dramatic 40 percent annual rise in demand for electricity in some areas, according to the Ministry of Electricity. This increased deficit has also led to daily hours-long, unscheduled power cuts. While such cuts were not unheard-of before the crisis, many areas, including the capital, now go without power for two to seven hours per day. Governmental efforts to improve the energy sector are underway. On December 7, the Ministry of Electricity launched a media campaign for rationing energy which includes raising efficiency through minimising power consumption, enhancing performance, and using renewable resources. "Rationing potentials are between 30 to 70 percent of the total consumption," Imad Mohammad Deeb Khamis, Syrian minister of electricity, said in a speech at the campaign launch.
Hidden Costs Abdullah Khattab, General Manager of the Syrian Company for the Distribution of Petroleum Products (Mahrukat), criticised this policy, saying that a country which has a strong economy does not subsidise petrol derivatives. "The current subsidising method drains the national economy," Khattab told Al-Iqtissadiya on October 23. "We expect the subsidies on petrol derivatives to exceed SYP 150bn (USD 2.7bn)." Jihad Yazigi, an economist and editor of the economic newsletter Syria Report, also thinks that the subsidies are not sustainable in the long-term. "The policy of selling a product at a price five times lower than its cost simply does not make sense in economic terms," Yazigi said. "Of course people need to be helped, because Syrians' earnings are too low to enable them to purchase a product priced at world levels. Subsidies, however, lead to smuggling and huge waste. Other means of support must be put in place."
Arbache called on the Syrian government to invest in renewable resources and develop new drilling technologies. "With the [cost of] subsidies for one year, Syria could build a new refinery," he said. |
16 May 2012
| ||||
