by Bahle Gama
The country’s fuel average daily demand in this reporting period stood at 931 681 litres, resulting in the currently available storage capacity amounting to a maximum of four days.
According to the Eswatini Regulatory Authority (ESERA) petroleum industry annual compliance report 2023/24, commercial stocks averaged between 1-2 days owing mainly to poor utilization of available capacity as well as inadequate fuel storage facilities in the Kingdom of Eswatini.
The average utilization rate of the available storage capacity over this reporting period ranged between 35 percent and 43 percent.
A total of 7 599 508 litres of operational storage capacity is currently held at the retail level, which is used to store trading stocks at retail sites.
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Over 340 million litres of fuel (Unleaded Petrol 95 and Diesel 50 ppm) was imported and sold in the 2023-24 financial year, of which 148.3 million litres was petrol, and 191.6 million diesel.
During the reporting period, only three out of 13 licensed wholesalers had operational fuel storage facilities, which is one of the major reasons behind the security of supply challenges facing the country.
“It is also worth mentioning that some of the wholesalers are in the process of developing their commercial storage facilities while others are looking forward to the prospects of keeping their commercial stocks in the upcoming strategic fuel reserve facility,” states the report.
Meanwhile, the technical compliance of licensees was measured against a set criterion, presented in the form of an inspection checklist, whose focus was on regulatory compliance, operational safety,
plant and equipment maintenance, and emergency preparedness within the context of relevant regulations and acceptable industry standards.
For each of the categories of licensees, including retail, commercial consumer, and LPG) a customised inspection checklist, was used for the technical compliance measurement.
Over this reporting period, the Authority says it has been monitoring the compliance of 118 licensed retailers,
22 of which were new business establishments that had not yet started business operations but were at various stages of the construction of their retail service stations.
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The compliance level of operational retailers in the Kingdom of Eswatini, over this reporting period, was at an average of 83 per cent.
This improvement has been attributed to the compliance enforcement measures employed over the last financial year; wherein non-compliant sites were closely monitored through frequent follow-up inspections.
“Where situations were found to pose an immediate threat to life and/or the environment, the affected licensee was instructed to institute immediate corrective actions,
which at times included the temporal closure of the site pending clearance of the issues raised,” reported ESERA.
