Last night, we told you about the latest in the battle over Liquified Petroleum Gas, which has been playing out in the Supreme Court, and the Appeal Court.
The 3 Central American importers of cooking gas: Gas Tomza, Southern Choice Butane, and Belize Western Energy Limited, are no longer authorized to import butane into Belize. Their import license from the Government expired last week Thursday. As we've reported, they've gone to the high courts to challenge the Barrow Administration's refusal to renew those licenses.
We'll tell you all about their issues on that front, but first, we turn to a concern these companies raised in a press release from yesterday. They say that as a result of the government's refusal to renew their import license, they can't guarantee an uninterrupted supply of butane for customers who need to fill up.
Their press release says, quote, "Currently, there is a limited supply of LPG available to the public for distribution as today, the Belize Bureau of Standards has refused to give any further importation license and unfortunately, (the new supplier National Gas) has not been able to indicate how it plans to distribute LPG to consumers..." End quote.
That's worrying news for all of us stuck at home and cooking as a necessity. Will there be butane to re-fill when you need to feed your family? We sought answers from the regulator, and from the National Gas Company, which is now the only company allowed to import LPG into Belize.
They told us via teleconference, and telephone this evening, that the country has more than enough LPG. Here's how they explained why you don't have to worry about a butane shortage for at least the next 2 months.
Jose Trejo, Controller of Supplies, BBS
"We have been monitoring the importation of LPG like we normally do every given month. We know exactly what comes into the country. On average the country consumes about 12-13 million. In the month of April alone we noted like beefing up of the LPG imported into the country. I guess because we had already written letters informing them that of April 30th we would be able to issue any more licenses to import LPG into the country, so what we know in terms of the importation of LPG we are looking at roughly about over 1 million gallons that were imported. I do know that there are current tanks sitting in Belize City right now for one of the companies. I haven't physically seen them but based on the images that have been shared with me from my staff, who have been working in that municipality - in their estimation, it's about 10-12 tanks that were sitting there waiting to discharge LPG into the country. Each tank is about 8,800 gallons."
Voice of Dr. Gilbert Canton, Managing Director, Nat'l Gas Company
"The bottom line is that we have successfully brought in a shipment last week, the inaugural shipment into Belize of LPG directly from the US Gulf Coast. We have over 1.4 million gallons of LPG in the country stored in tanks in Big Creek. That, in the normal consumption pattern, would be about a month and a half supply for the country, with the lower demand and consumption right now because of Cocid-19, it could be more than 2 months of supply. So there is no way there would be a shortage of supply. The country I think has more LPG on hand right now than ever before."
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