Mohammad Reza Aref, First Vice President of the Islamic Republic’s government, said that, stressing the need for what he called “reforming the energy consumption model,” “we must make the public understand that part of the country’s revenues is currently spent on providing gasoline, and this imposes costs and pressures on other sectors.”

Aref, on Saturday, 31 Mordad, at the “National Conference on Green Industry, Mining and Services,” pointed to differences in fuel consumption among income groups, saying that the level of consumption in the tenth quintile, the richest quintile of society, is about 23 to 24 times that of the first quintile.

Aref went on to link opposition to an increase in gasoline prices to the reaction of low-income groups to changes in policies related to energy consumption, and said: “When it is decided that reforms should be carried out in this area, precisely some segments of vulnerable groups and those who, in any case, face problems in their lives are encouraged to say that gasoline should not be made more expensive.”