fuel prices

In a statement Minister of Finance, Mulipola Anarosa Molio'o said petrol prices will drop by 31.2 sene litre from $3.35 to $3.03 per litre together with diesel and kerosene prices.

"Diesel will decrease by 44.3 sene per liter from $3.96 to $3.52 per litre and kerosene will decrease by 37.8 sene per litre from $3.49 to $3.11 per litre.”

Molio'o also said, "Whilst freight rates increase, the strengthening of the Samoan Tala versus the US$ had a favorable impact on landed costs.”

Petrol has increased by 0.5 sene per litre from $3.34 to $3.35.

Diesel has decreased by 19.9 sene per litre from $4.16 to $3.96.

The price of kerosene has also decreased by 8.5 sene per litre from $3.57 to $3.49.

The change in prices that are in effect for January were announced by the Minister of Finance Mulipola Anarosa Ale Molio’o.

The Government said global prices for diesel and kerosene declined while petrol prices increased marginally in November, the base month for setting the country’s January retail prices.

Air New Zealand chief executive Greg Foran told Checkpoint that the price of fuel "has moved pretty quickly". 

"Over the last few months, we've seen effectively a doubling in price and I've referred to the fact that getting to Los Angeles, it used to cost us just over US$40,000 to fill up a Dreamliner and now it's about US$96,000, so that's seen the price of tickets on average increase around 20 plus percent."

Both commodities are now settled at below $2 tala per litre for the month of July.

The ministry has confirmed that the last time diesel was below $2 tala was back in 2016, for the month of March that was worth of $1.79, April was $1.84 and May’s price was around $1.99.

The price of a litre of petrol was decreased to $1.92 last month.

This is the first time in over 10 years that the price is below $2 tala per litre.

The last time that happened was in January 2009, when petrol was $1.97 a litre.

This was after the mid-September drone attacks on the Abqaiq oil refinery in Saudi Arabia.

This is according to the Ministry of Finance release which states that, “MOPS (price of fuel in Singapore) increased in September (which sets November prices) by an average of US$3.00 / bbl these increases are directly attributed to the drone attacks on the Saudi Oil refineries”.

The Ministry of Finance says other contributing factors are increases in freight prices and the continued deprecation of the Tala against the US dollar.

For a drone attack to have knocked half of its - and 5% of the world's - oil supply offline, speaks to the vulnerability of their plants and in turn to the vulnerability of a vital part of the global energy infrastructure.

The Khurais oilfield produces about 1% of the world's oil, and Abqaiq is the company's largest facility - with the capacity to process 7% of the global supply.

Questions being asked centre on why this attack could not have been prevented by a company with such deep pockets and whether it can happen again.

Minister of Finance Sili Epa Tuioti announced new prices effective from 1 March 2018.

The price of a litre of petrol has increased by 2 sene to now cost $2.69.

Diesel has increased by 5 sene to $2.70 a litre.

The price of kerosene has increased by 6 sene from $2.31 to $2.37 a litre.

A statement said the March prices reflected January Singapore Prices ‘MOPS’ which recorded increases between US $3.00/bbl and 5.50/bbl.

Freight Costs decreased by US$3.50/ MT and the TALA strengthened against the US$ by 2.3% easing some of the impact of the higher MOPS.”