Letter to Editor-Price of petrol |19 September 2009

While it may be true that petrol per litre is cheaper in Seychelles than in Norway, a more accurate indicator would have been to compare the cost of a litre of petrol in those two countries relative to how much the average person earns in those two countries.

Based on GDP per capita as a rough estimate of how much the average person earns in each country, the average for Norway is R94,000 per month, while in Seychelles the average is R9,500. 

This means that relative to how much a person earns, the cost of a litre of petrol in Norway is 0.029% of average income and 0.18% in Seychelles. This means that relative to how much a person earns, the price of petrol in Seychelles is six times more expensive than in Norway.

I hope you will find this enlightening. After all, the aim of the national newspaper is to enlighten and educate the population, and I feel it is only fair that we compare apples to apples and not apples to oranges.

Ronny Ah-Tive

Editor’s Note: While we agree with Mr Ah-Tive that we should compare “apples to apples and not apples to oranges”, we also feel that Mr Ah-Tive should be the first one to follow this principle by comparing what a person earns in Seychelles to the salary of a person in Mauritius, for example, and definitely not to “wealthy” Norway. Furthermore, for the price of petrol in an oil-producing country like Norway to be more expensive than in resource-scarce Seychelles is somewhat baffling!