An official of the Department of Energy (DOE) said a big hike expected in oil prices next week as crude prices have increased around $14 per barrel since last month.

"Before, the average Dubai crude price in January 2022 was around 83.46-US dollar per barrel. One February 2022 it reached 92 US dollar and on our last monitoring, on March 3, the Dubai crude was around $116.19," said Rino Abad, director of the DOE's International Management Bureau, in Saturday's ''Laging Handa'' virtual public forum.

''So definitely, you can see that there will be a big increase in fuel prices next week,'' said Abad.

''But, I really cannot give the public in advance the exact amount,'' said Abad.

A news report said gasoline is expected to go up early next to at least P3 a liter, diesel, around P5 a liter and kerosine, P4 a liter.

Abad said Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi met oil companies late Friday. The companies said as of February 28, the inventory of finished oil products is 28 days. Including those held by direct importer of liquid fuel, the total inventory is an average of 40 days, said Abad.

Talks with the Philippine National Oil Company have begun on creating a strategic petroleum reserve program and the DOE wants to find out the storage capacity of each oil company, Abad said.

The reserve program will be activated if their is disruption of fuel supply, Abad added.

Cusi thanked oil companies for their fuel discount which range from P1 to P4, added Abad.

Abad said there are theories that lead to lower fuel prices in the next few weeks.

"Because of the effect of this conflict between Russia and Ukraine, these are two big countries including the combined sanction of US, UK and EU. The theory is because of that combined sanction, there will be weakening of global economy especially those that are transacting business with both Russia and Ukraine and because of that the weakening of the demand of oil will also weaken," he said.

"So even if the supply will not increase, if the demand is low, at least the equation of supply balance will reverse and we may have an oversupply and with that, we may have a rollback. But we need to monitor that development in the coming weeks or months," he added. Robina Asido/DMS