When the Prime Minister announced on Tuesday that the fuel subsidy has become untenable, and noted the true price of diesel and gasoline at the pump, it sent tremors through the country.
TT has spent $38.1 billion since 1997 to hold consumer fuel prices, but with the rising price of oil (surging over US$100 per barrel), and reduced revenue from the oil and gas sector, the country faces a perfect economic storm.
Oil production in 2021 is a third of 2009 exports, and gas production last year was half what it was in 2010.
TT will get better prices for its fossil-fuel commodities, but we have significantly less to sell.
And this is only the first shockwave of the global economy and supply chain.
Ukraine is the second largest nation in Europe after Russia, and because of its highly fertile soil, known as chernozem, is a major exporter of sunflower and cottonseed oil (18 per cent of world exports), corn (16 per cent) barley (12 per cent) and wheat (eight per cent).
Russia ships 18 per cent of the global supply of wheat, and Russia's major export is crude oil, delivering ten per cent of global supply.
Those are two core inputs for TT affecting the price of fuel and the cost of wheat, along with other products and raw materials from the affected nations.
The nations of the EU and their major trading partners will feel the first impact.
Russia and the Ukraine supply Turkey and Egypt with 78 per cent of their wheat and India buys 80 per cent of its oil from Russia.
The first response among affected European nations has been to cushion these rising prices, but there's little local leeway for that after TT spent more than $5 billion on efforts to manage a stalled economy over the last two years.
The TT government has discussed market pricing for fuel at the pump, but the Chamber of Industry and Commerce and the Opposition found common ground in noting that removing fuel transfers and subsidies suddenly will be a dramatic shock.
Whatever the timeline of the planned subsidy reduction, it will be an inevitable first step in rationalising local fuel use.
The Prime Minister appears to think that people use their cars indiscriminately because of cheap gas - but there isn't an efficient, convenient and affordable mass transit system to provide an alternative.
Nobody wants to sit in traffic for hours each way to get to work and back home.
His overdue instruction to the Energy Ministry to accelerate the often promised and delayed programme to increase the number of electric buses must be matched by an overhaul of the Public Transport Service Corporation, putting an emphasis on customer satisfaction, timeliness and reliability; and possibly even a long-term rethink about an alternative rail or water transport system.
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