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Fattouh, Bassam and El-Katiri, Laura (2012) Energy Subsidies in the Arab World. New York, NY: United Nations Development Programme.

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Abstract

The policy of maintaining tight control of domestic energy prices has characterized the political and economic environment in most Arab countries, together with many other parts of the world, for decades. The objectives behind such a policy range from overall welfare objectives such as expanding energy access and protecting poor households’ incomes; to economic development objectives such as fostering industrial growth and smoothing domestic consumption; and to politi- cal considerations, including the distribution of oil and natural gas rents in resource-rich countries. While energy subsidies may be seen as achieving some of a country’s objectives, this paper argues they are a costly and inefficient way of doing so. Energy subsidies distort price signals, with serious implications on efficiency and the optimal allocation of resources. Energy subsidies also tend to be regressive, with high-income households and industries benefiting proportionately most from low energy prices. However, despite such adverse effects, energy subsidies constitute an important social safety net for the poor in many parts of the Arab world, and any attempts to reduce or eliminate them in the absence of compensatory programmes would lead to a decline in households’ welfare and erode the competitiveness of certain industries. Therefore, a critical factor for successful reforms will be the ability of governments to compensate their populations for the reduction or removal of subsidies through carefully designed mitigation measures that protect the poorest and assist the economy in its long-term adaptation. We argue that a reform of energy pric- ing mechanisms in the Arab world may be seen as beneficial from more than one perspective, and as offering potential paths for reform. Nevertheless, this paper recognizes that the current political climate in the region will render the reform of domestic energy prices difficult in practice, such that reform may indeed be a medium- to long-term endeavour.

Item Type: Monographs and Working Papers (Discussion Paper)
SOAS Departments & Centres: Legacy Departments > Faculty of Law and Social Sciences > School of Finance and Management
Legacy Departments > Faculty of Law and Social Sciences > Department of Politics and International Studies > Centre on the Politics of Energy Security (CEPES)
Copyright Statement: Copyright @ Bassam Fattouh and Laura El-Katiri 2012
Date Deposited: 02 Oct 2012 14:30
URI: https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/id/eprint/14266

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