Address Distortive Subsidies

155.  Transport PPP may be susceptible to the distortions caused by fuel subsidies. Many MENA countries continue to heavily subsidise motive fuels, diesel and gasoline. Where these fuels form a major input cost for competing forms or modes of transport, it may be difficult for a PPP to compete. For example, a rail transport project may not be viable in the face of a trucking sector that benefits from heavily subsidised diesel. Such subsidies are also problematic from an environmental and fiscal policy perspective. Reforming long-standing and politically popular fuel subsidies may be very difficult but governments should understand that transport sector PPPs may not be feasible in the absence of such reform.