In “Dynamics of Petroleum Products Marketing”, Billy Okoye Pulls His Punches

By Oluwatobi Odeyinka

Staff Reporter

Even as the epic transformation of the global economy plays itself out, petroleum products remain the hegemon of all energy sources, at least in the next decade.

So we should welcome a book with the title Dynamics of Petroleum Products Marketing, which, its author says, sets out to provide “a deeper understanding of the petroleum products industry’s role in our world, the ethical principles that should guide its operations, and the importance of sustainable and responsible practices.”

The author comes highly recommended. Okey Billy Okoye, a former Managing Director/CEO of NNPC Retail Limited, who went on to become the Group Executive Director at the mother company, NNPCL, is a professor and coordinator, Oil, Gas & Energy Marketing at the University of Abuja Business School.

The language of the text is simple, lucid and largely self-explanatory. It will be particularly valuable to students and professionals.

Still, a question nags as you work through the book. How far does Dynamics go to meet its objective of providing “a deeper understanding of the petroleum products industry’s role in our world, the ethical principles that should guide its operations..” This book would naturally be expected to deliver more than definitions of concepts and the academic explanation of operations and practices in the petroleum industry; it would be expected to more practical examples in the Nigerian context, more illustrations and data than it does. And the author would be expected to provide some of his personal experiences as an executive in the industry.

Dynamics takes off with a comprehensive discussion of the petroleum products value chain in Chapter 1.

The chapter on storage depots exhaustively explores Nigeria’s petroleum storage infrastructure on paper, but it fails to give an update on the availability of the storage facilities. It says there are depots in Mosimi, Enugu, Ibadan, Kaduna, and various cities across the six geopolitical zones of this country. It does not tell us, how many of them are functioning or were functioning at the time of completion of the book. It avoids retailing information on the capacity of each depot, and their supply networks. Not answering these questions as an authority leaves room for assumptions, and insufficient background data before the reader transitions to the chapters on marketing and distribution dynamics.

Chapter six which discusses risk management in the Nigerian petroleum products market equally lacks context and nuances to achieve depth.

Professor Billy-Okoye

However, chapters seven and eight which discuss guidelines and logistics in petroleum products marketing did not suffer the same surface-level presentation. Chapter seven in particular contains examples and specific contexts from the Nigerian petroleum industry. The good professor gave examples of the NNPC’s Direct Sale Direct Purchase Programme, and the regulatory guidelines for the importation of petroleum products.

Chapter nine, which aims to explore leadership in petroleum marketing, explains the role of leadership in the volatile petroleum marketing sector. It also appropriately situates leadership within the context of globalization, market uncertainty, and regulations, all of which are relevant in today’s oil and gas industry. However, the chapter fails to provide case studies in the Nigerian or global petroleum market. Mr Okoye as an executive in NNPCL, must have interfaced with the leadership of the large multinational companies who operated in Nigeria for a significant part of his over 30 year industry career; he most likely has case studies that could have enriched this chapter. The leadership challenges outlined are also not context-based or sector-specific.

Chapters 11 and 12 also offer some depth to the book, as the writer exhaustively discusses digital marketing and the Nigerian downstream petroleum sector. In chapter 12, the author gave historical references on the topic of deregulation. However, it would have been helpful if the author had compared the results of the implementation of partial and full deregulation of the downstream in Nigeria with other countries that have followed the same path.

Chapter 13, which discusses fuel subsidies, is enriched with data. It reveals that subsidy payments rose from ₦1.3Trillion in 2013 to ₦ 4.4Trillion in 2022. Fuel subsidies gulped more allocations than defense, health, and education.

Professor Okoye identifies smuggling as a major impediment to the fuel subsidy regime. However, his attempt to quantify Nigeria’s daily fuel consumption was speculative. As someone who headed the retail arm of the NNPC, he could have provided a more reliable figure. Indeed, like other stakeholders have disclosed, smuggling makes it difficult for Nigeria to quantify its fuel consumption.

Chapter 14 outlines solutions to fuel scarcity, but it is not clear if these solutions are recommended for Nigeria. It reads like a ‘literature review’ on aspects and remedies to fuel scarcity.

Chapter 16, which is on the role of security agencies in the petroleum market, also fails to discuss the topic beyond the statutory functions of the agencies. It also fails to mention joint task forces or joint operations among the agencies, and more importantly, the war on oil theft (including petroleum product theft)  and pipeline vandalism headed by the NNPC. The same approach is taken in discussing the roles of regulatory agencies.

The last chapter (20), which focuses on energy transition offers a broad overview of the energy transition, covering both supply-side (company strategies) and demand-side (consumer behaviour) perspectives. However, it does not offer much technical depth as to how petroleum companies are integrating alternative fuels, or challenges peculiar to the Nigerian market. It also overlooks issues such as energy access, and how the transition could disproportionately impact low-income citizens and small businesses, who cannot afford the clean energy technologies.

The book, Dynamics of Petroleum Products Marketing offers an educational and educative overview of the petroleum industry in Nigeria and across the globe. Save for the lack of adequate contexts and insights from real-life events, it does provide readers with some foundational understanding of the petroleum products market.