Oil import bill rises 31% in 2018

MANILA, Philippines — Higher volume and import cost pushed the Philippine net oil import  up by nearly a third last year.

The net import bill or the difference between oil imports and exports amounted to $12.12 billion in 2018, 30.9 percent higher than the year ago, data from the Department of Energy showed.

According to the DOE, the country’s total oil import bill reached $13.48 billion, a 31.8 percent jump from the previous year.

“This was attributed to the combined effects of higher import cost and increased import volume of crude oil vis-à-vis last year,” the DOE said.

Of the total imports, 54.5 percent consists of finished products and 45.5 percent crude oil.

The country imported 85,753 million barrels (MB) of crude oil last year, an increase of 10.4 percent.

In terms of cost, the 2018 figure amounted to $6.14 billion or 41.8 percent more than the year earlier due to higher cost insurance freight (CIF) price.

The average CIF price of crude oil was at $71.59 per barrel last year compared with $55.77 per barrels year ago.

Bulk of the imported crude oil, or 86.9 percent, was sourced from the Middle East.

Saudi Arabia was the top supplier, accounting for 33.7 percent, followed by Kuwait with 26.3 percent and the UAE with 20.9 percent.

The country also imported 7.4 percent from Russia and 4.5 percent from the ASEAN region.

Meanwhile, there was 0.1 percent of crude oil from local production.

In terms of petroleum products, the country imported a total of 97.57 MB.

The top imported product for the period was diesel oil, which declined by 3.3 percent. Fuel oil imports also decreased by 24.2 percent.

 On the other hand, the import of gasoline went up by 10.7 percent, LPG by 9.4 percent, and kerosene/avturbo by 3.8 percent.

In terms of exports, the country’s petroleum exports earnings grew 40 percent to $1.36 million.

This as the country exported 17.04 MB of petroleum products exports, which rose 16.7 percent.