WARSAW, Sept 21 – Poland’s government has decided to suspend duties on all imported fuel in an effort to ease rising prices and head off a big jump in inflation, officials said Thursday.
Some fuel dealers said they doubted the move would mean lower prices at the pump soon, however, because fuel sold by Polish refineries that dominate the market already is cheaper than imports.
The decision, made late Wednesday, appeared to reflect concern about overall inflation more than anger over rising fuel prices that have sparked disruptive protests across Europe. In a statement announcing the move, the government said it was aiming to “weaken inflationary impulses.”
“I think this is a step into a right direction,” Poland’s central bank president, Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, said Thursday. She said the decision should help contain long-term inflation.
On Sept. 12, the government lifted duties on fuels imported from the European Union, the European Free Trade Association and the Central European Free Trade Association.
The new decision expands the move to all imported fuel, including supplies from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.
Fuel price increases helped push the annual inflation rate to 11.6 percent in July at a time when Poland is struggling to make its economy fit for EU membership.
Witold Ozimski of fuel company Reflex said Polish-refined diesel and gasoline is already cheaper than imported Western fuel.
“Refineries in the east also can do math and certainly won’t sell so cheaply,” the daily Gazeta Wyborcza quoted him as saying.
But Czary Nowosielski of the Polish Association of Liquid Fuels said Polish dealers might now be more interested in buying from Russia and Ukraine.
“There is some interest,” he said. “Many companies used to be interested in imports from the east but the duties used to be too high.”
Last Friday, truckers in Poland protested high fuel prices by slowing their rigs to a crawl on highways across the country,disrupting traffic for a half-day.
