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V. Mindova

The Greek government imposed a price ceiling for the gasoline as a temporary measure for the prevention of speculation on the fuel market. The restriction will be in force for about three weeks for the period between March 24^th and April 11^th this year in eight municipalities in Greece – Lasitiou, Retminis, Hanst, Heraklio, Dodekanisia, Fokidos, Tesprotias, Prevezis. For each municipality a separate value of the price ceiling has been calculated. The new measure is introduced with the aim of protecting the consumers from the unnatural increase of the prices of fuels, however paradoxically it turns out that the ceiling imposed by the government of PASOK provides for prices higher than the current ones on the market.

An owner of a gas station on the island of Crete says for the ΣΚΑΪ television that the price for a liter of gasoline in his gas station was 1,48 euro. The businessman points out that the introduced by the government ceiling of the prices of the fuels is 4 euro cents higher than the current market price or it is 1,52 euro per liter. According to the experts the main problem in forming the prices of the fuels is created by the wholesale suppliers and the refineries. The lack of legislative standards to protect the end customer from speculations gives the opportunity to the big companies for import and processing of fuels to change the prices regardless of the consequences for the end user and the market as a whole.

“Once again the politicians demonstrated their incapability of imposing a price ceiling on all the stages of movement of the market of fuels – from the refineries to the private gas stations. An example for this is the Heraklio municipality where the average value for the wholesale purchasing of gasoline is 1,52 euro per liter and it exceeds the average end price for the consumer. In other words the lack of control on the prices of the wholesale producers makes us sell the gasoline at a loss. This is true for many regions in the interior of the country and the islands in Greece,” points out Haris Mavrakis, chairman of the Union of the owners of gas stations in the Heraklio municipality.

“The dissatisfaction of my colleagues in the regions with price ceiling is reasonable”, says for GRReporter an employee in a gas station in the capital and continues: “In a period of crisis the principles of the free market are broken by the speculators. The government finally has to put some order in forming of the prices by starting from the big companies – refineries. The gas stations are at the end of the food chain and a ceiling only for the retail prices will not solve our problems,” he explains.