Africa-Press – Botswana. Government acknowledges and appreciates the role that the petroleum industry has been playing in the country even prior to the establishment of a regulator.
Speaking during the official launch of the star rating programme in Mmamashia, Friday Minister of Minerals and Energy Mr Lefoko Moagi said the industry had been growing at an even faster pace as a result of government’s interventions in support of citizen entrepreneurs.
“I’m informed that Botswana Energy Regulatory Authority (BERA) issued at least 132 new petroleum licenses between April 2018 and August 2022. Of these 51 were for import, 53 were for retail service stations, 12 construction of new retail service stations, 10 storage facilities while the remaining six were export licenses,” he said.
Mr Moagi said this was a clear indication that the petroleum industry was growing and that there should be proper regulation in place to ensure fair play in terms of quality, safety, competition and pricing.
He said it was important for government to establish a regulator that had a mandate over all safety, quality and economic matters of the sector.
Mr Moagi said it was gratifying to learn that BERA had heeded the call and designed a regulatory framework including instruments and tools such as the star rating programme that would ensure maximum safety and environmental protection through compliance monitoring.
“The star rating programme will therefore benefit both the industry and the consumers. We already have been told that the industry’s compliance costs will be reduced owing to less enforcement penalties and sanctions.
This will increase efficiency in the industry’s operations and ensure that profits are kept as marginal as possible,” he added.
Mr Moagi said petroleum products were a key economic driver hence their prices influenced inflation.
He said it was vital that there was a regulator that ensured the cost in the sector were reasonable. Ms Monnakgotla (left) interacting with residents after addressing a kgotla meeting in Grootlagte. She challenged the youth and women to exploit programmes and projects tailor made for them. Minister Moagi said government paid the industry huge sums of money in order to cushion Batswana from escalating fuel prices and prevent shocks to a vulnerable economy.
“Whilst this cannot be avoided it will be beneficial if the regulator could come up with strategies and programmes that can assure government of industry efficiencies.
In my view the star rating programme is one of the ways in which BERA could use to provide these assurances to government,” he said.
For his part, BERA Board Chairperson Mr Justice Moilwa said the launch marked a key milestone in the mandate of his organisation and demonstrated BERA’s quest to strengthen regulation of the energy sector.
He said the star rating programme was conceptualised in an endeavour to deliver on one of the specific duties and functions of BERA namely, the need to monitor the performance of the regulated entities using various key performance indicators as spelt out in the BERA Act.
“In aligning execution of our mandate as BERA to national priorities we support the aspirations and determination of government in moving to a high-income country by 2036 through this programme.
We believe that as a country that is in transit from middle to a high-income economy our facilities and business environment should be in a satisfactory state,” he said. He said the programme was thus designed to ensure that facilities were properly maintained and appealing.
The programme, he said was aimed at promoting voluntary compliance, improving service delivery, strengthening regulation through public participation, reducing compliance and monitoring costs and improving the overall aesthetic value of retail service stations.
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