MANILA – Local oil companies will be constrained to provide more detailed explanations regarding price adjustments when the Department of Energy (DOE) begins enforcing a new policy demanding greater transparency from the petroleum industry.
The DOE made this announcement on Tuesday saying that its “stricter” policy on pump price monitoring is likely to begin next month. “This means the oil firms can no longer just say that the price adjustments they will implement are ‘based on the movement in the international petroleum market’,” spokesperson Felix William Fuentebella told the Philippine News Agency (PNA).
He said the DOE will check the unbundling of the base prices of petroleum products, from the port up to the retailing.
“This is also to ensure that consumers get the right quality of oil products, and give them advice such as where they can get good quality products and where they can get more affordable ones,” he explained. “Before the Duterte administration, we don’t check the oil products from the port up to the retailing,” Fuentebella added.
In preparation for the issuance of the new policy, the DOE, through the Oil Industry Management Bureau, has been conducting consultations with industry stakeholders.
Fuentebella said initial reaction from the industry during consultations was that in accordance with the Oil Regulation Law, the government’s intervention must be limited. “What we’re doing is also for the protection of the industry, because we are going to check the quality of petroleum products,” he explained.
When the new policy is issued, DOE will require oil firms to provide a weekly notice of the pump price adjustments alongside with the computation of their products’ components based on the elements involved in the international price movement, the biofuels cost and the capital/operational cost recovery.
The weekly oil pricing updates should be announced publicly by all oil companies to guide the consumers in making informed decisions in the management of their fuel oil requirements. “Currently, we don’t require oil firms to announce pump prices adjustments weekly. Those who have been doing it in a weekly basis are doing it for marketing purposes,” Fuentebella said.
Meanwhile, the DOE will also require oil companies/bulk suppliers and retail outlets to submit baseline data every end of the year for the unbundling of their base price. (Ma. Cristina Arayata/PNA)
