BY JOHN HOUANIHAU
Governor of the Central Bank of Solomon Islands (CBSI) Dr Luke Forau said the country does not have fuel security but fuel for consumption.
He made the statement when he responded to a question raised by a local journalist on the country’s position on fuel crises in relation to the current crises in Middle East at the Public Symposium on “From the Middle East to the Pacific: Understanding the Global Oil Shock and Its Economic Implications”.
Speaking at the Symposium which was held at the Solomon Islands National University (SINU) Kukum Lecture Theatre on Wednesday this week he said at the moment the country does not have a fuel security in place.
“When you say fuel security. I think at the moment we don’t have fuel security in place. What we currently have is fuel for consumption,” he said.
He however said that it is an agenda the CBSI with stakeholders are looking into addressing it together with the Government.
“That is something for the government in the medium to long term to look into,” he said.
He said that fuel security is one of the agenda that they are looking at to collaborate with the government to ensure that there is fuel security policy in place.
“The impact of it not having a fuel security is if the crisis is prolonged. At the moment, we don’t know how long it will take. But if it goes beyond what we cannot imagine, then it will definitely have an impact on us. If supply is short, it means that we don’t have any fuel,” Forau said.
He said that most of the businesses that are depending heavily on fuel will be affected.
“Their operations might scale down or even close. And that is the worst-case scenario, which we don’t want to go to that extent,” he said.
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