Stabex International one of largest oil marketers in Uganda and a fast growing petroleum company in Kenya is rolling out its Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) brand in the two markets, leveraging a distribution network of more than 70 retail petrol stations. It is further deploying a distribution network worth millions of shillings across the two countries to enhance LPG supply efficiency.
Stabex LPG will now be available in major townships across the two countries.
Stabex International now joins other major players in the petroleum industry that are strongly positioning their LPG brands targeting to grow market share in the widely untapped regional cooking gas market. Under the Sustainable Development Goals,
LPG is recommended for cooking purposes as it plays an important role in reducing adverse effects of gases on our environment, is clean and helps improve household respiratory health.
“LPG usage has an untapped market size of about 83% and 89% in Kenya and Uganda respectively. At Stabex, we see this as a huge opportunity in both countries and are aligning our penetration strategy with the ‘UN Sustainable Energy for All Initiative’ whose goal is to have one billion more people cooking cleanly with LPG energy by 2030” said Head of Supply and Business Development, Mr. Benson Mwangi.
The population in both markets presently relies on unclean energy such as firewood, charcoal and paraffin with LPG remaining unaffordable due to the initial high cost of acquisition.
The company is innovating affordability solutions to enable it to lighten the initial equipment cost for new LPG consumers especially in rural East Africa.
“Our strategic sales teams will now focus on opening up new markets for LPG in rural areas through affordability programs. A set of other strategies will help us compete for footfall in urban markets with other gas brands to grow market share.” said Mr. Mwangi.
It is projected that coordinated marketing efforts by Stabex will grow LPG usage resulting in a market expansion of 6% in three years.
According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS), Kenya alone had up to 300,000 metric tonnes of LPG demand, against an annual supply of 170,000 metric tonnes.
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