Photo from THEPHILBIZNEWS
Consumers brace for another round of oil price hike as pump prices for both diesel and gasoline products are up by P0.65 per liter.
The kerosene product prices are also up by P0.65 per liter and this would inevitably be affecting the households who are using it for their lighting and cooking and other industries that use oil including the aviation sectors.
Petroleum companies like Pilipinas Shell, Petron, Seaoil, Total, PTT Philippines, and Phoenix Petroleum made price adjustment already effective Tuesday, September 11 at 6AM. Other players will certainly follow suit.
It is the Dubai crude price that affected the oil price hike to US$75 per barrel from last week’s US$73 per barrel average.
With this market trend and the winter fats approaching, fears of hitting US$80 per barrel is likely to happen because of the imposition of sanction on Iran.
The unstoppable oil price hike has created worries to the Employers as they recently released their statement asking the government to suspend fuel excise tax because of the inflation.
Employers Confederation of the Philippines (ECOP) in a statement released expressed their concern over inflation’s shooting up to 6.4 percent in August. The group said it is alarming that the Philippines now has the highest inflation rate in Southeast Asia.
See related story:
Employers Confederation worries by inflation, seeks suspension on fuel excise tax
Meanwhile, Energy Undersecretary Jesus Cristino Posadas of the Department of Energy (DOE) is exploring a new concept of “oil price subsidy” where contribution to the fund will come from industry players.
He said the conceptual framework of the subsidy kitty is symbolic of the defunct Oil Price Stabilization Fund (OPSF) when the oil sector was still under immutable government regulation.
“If prices are low, the oil companies can contribute to the fund. And they can draw from it when prices go up,” the energy official explained.
But he made clear by saying that this is just exploratory. “We are just toying the concepts for now…the Secretary has been finding ways how to stabilize prices” referring to Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi.
Posadas admitted though that this would be an uphill policy fray for the department.“We will not require it because it is a deregulated market, so this is optional. This is just an idea of the Secretary on how price stabilization mechanism should be,” Posadas stressed.
Instead of the government setting up a subsidy fund, the energy official noted that this will be entirely private sector-driven. He pointed out, “We will not require it because it is a deregulated market, so this is optional. This is just an idea of the Secretary on how price stabilization mechanism should be.”
