YEREVAN, March 11. /ARKA/. Armenia’s State Commission for the Protection of Economic Competition (SCPEC) said it had conducted two studies in December 2020 and January 2021 to find out what pushed the prices of gasoline and diesel fuel up from 10 to 30 drams per one liter.
According to SCPEC, due to the global coronavirus crisis world prices and demand for gasoline and oil products decreased pushing down the prices in Armenia down by 26 %.
However, the gradual recovery of the global economy led to an increase in prices, as a result, in April 2020 and February 2021, the price of Brent crude oil rose by 134%.
The devaluation of the Armenian dram also affected prices in Armenia- from January 2020 to January 2021, the US dollar against the Armenian dram increased by an average of 9%.
Also, prices for gasoline and diesel fuel in Russia increased in December compared to November 2020 by 5-8%, depending on the brand of gasoline and by 12% for diesel fuel, while in January 2021 compared to December 2020 gasoline prices increased by 10%, and diesel fuel prices by 6%.
“Consequently, the reasons behind the rise in prices for gasoline and diesel fuel in Armenia are the devaluation of the dram and the increase in purchase prices; as a result, as of February 19, the price for gasoline was 320 drams per liter,” SCPEC said.
According to the National Statistical Committee of Armenia, the prices for gasoline and diesel fuel in February 2021 increased by 2.3% from the previous month. Compared to February 2020- they were down by 6.6% and 17.1%, respectively and compared with December 2020, by 5.4% and 6.2%, respectively. ($1 – 525.93 drams).