EVALUATION OF MBS QUALITY ASSURANCE STANDARDS AND SYSTEMS USED AT FUEL DEPOT AND FILLING STATIONS OF MALAWI

The cases of selling poor quality liquid fuel has been daily alarm which perturbing the customers and nation to cause poor engine performance (engine wear) and other associated consequences. Therefore, the aim of this study titled “evaluation of MBS Quality Assurance Standards and Systems used at Fuel depots and Filling Stations” is to develop a framework that can drive and efforts for continual improvement of the depots and service station quality approach in operations and particularly for improvement of diesel and petrol fuel quality assurance system in reference to applicable requirements of the MS-113, 114, 121 and MS-172 of Malawi Standards was realised by means of checklist and questionnaire, from which I identified non-conformities.
There is average overall non-compliance of 38.89% (7 from 33 applicable requirements. Thus using the ‘5 whys’ approach (root cause analysis) and Pareto diagrams I found that 54% of identified non-conformities result from poor documentation and poor implementation of procedures, 14% from Poor regulatory and quality control team/watch amongst others.
I acknowledge that it might not be possible to meet all requirements of Malawi standards immediately since there is different quality management systems (private and Government), and life span of storage tanks, and therefore, is will be essential to allow different acceptable operations that can effectively impact in quality assurance according to standards. I then used the FMEA approach to analyse these non-conformities and ranked them according to their effective cost maintenance in fuel quality. The results from arrangement highlighted four most critical findings with highest performed and cost management of quality assurance.
These are: the non-existence of quality assurance and operational manual, personnel lack of training (formal experts); poor fuel storage tank cleaning periods, poor documentation and implementation of quality assurance procedures.
I then develop an action plan, a monitoring plan and a follow-up plan to ensure effective complied with required standards and operational systems for improvement of fuel quality in supply chain systems.

Therefore, the aim of this study titled “evaluation of MBS Quality Assurance Standards and Systems used at Fuel depots and Filling Stations” is to develop a framework that can drive and efforts for continual improvement of the depots and service station quality approach in operations and particularly for improvement of diesel and petrol fuel quality assurance system in reference to applicable requirements of the MS-113, 114, 121 and MS-172 of Malawi Standards was realised by means of checklist and questionnaire, from which I identified non-conformities. Thus using the ‘5 whys’ approach (root cause analysis) and Pareto diagrams I found that 54% of identified non-conformities result from poor documentation and poor implementation of procedures, 14% from Poor regulatory and quality control team/watch amongst others. I acknowledge that it might not be possible to meet all requirements of Malawi standards immediately since there is different quality management systems (private and Government), and life span of storage tanks, and therefore, is will be essential to allow different acceptable operations that can effectively impact in quality assurance according to standards. I then develop

Malawi has three major public strategic reserve depots in all regions of total capacity of 60,000,000 million litres managed by NOCMA and some minor depots and private depots managed by PIL members’ e.g. Total energy limited, PUMA, Petroda, just to mention some. NOCMA controls 90% of liquid fuel importation and storage of liquid fuel (Diesel, Petrol and or Jet-A1), and PIL control mostly the fuel retailing. NOCMA has a mission to promote upstream oil and gas activities and ensure a competitive, secure and sustainable supply of liquid fuel to all parts of the country, and one of their core values is Safety, Health and Environmental care which part is part of quality assurance management of their liquid fuel (NOCMA).
MERA and MBS are public institutions which work hand in hand with NOCMA and PIL members for quality assurance of liquid fuels in the country. MERA and MBS are responsible for ensuring that fuel quality meets the required standards in Malawi.
They conduct quality control inspections and tests of petroleum products and their facilities (storage tanks and tankers) (w.D.Saiwa, 2017).
Blantyre is one of the districts where there is one of public strategic reserves depot and some PIL depots. According to (MERA, 2016) report, claims that Blantyre has more than 50 service filling stations which operates across the district. Map shows some filling stations in the Blantyre city.

District: Blantyre

Coordinates: -15.6817, 34.92535