Oil import bill drops 12% to $6.78 B in 2016

By Danessa Rivera (The Philippine Star) | Updated March 14, 2017 - 12:00am

http://www.philstar.com:8080/business/2017/03/14/1680777/oil-import-bill-drops-12-6.78-b-2016

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine oil import bill further dropped in 2016 as global prices continued to slip even as the country imported more petroleum products, latest Department of Energy (DOE) data showed.

The net import bill, or the difference between oil imports and exports, amounted to $6.78 billion last year, down 12.4 percent from $7.73 billion in 2015, DOE data showed.

The drop was attributed to the “lower cost of oil in 2016 than in 2015,” DOE-Oil Industry Management Bureau director Melita Obillo said in a text message yesterday.

The data showed total product import cost for the period averaged $42.16 per barrel versus the average cost of $51.8 per barrel the previous year.

The country imported a total 164,880 million barrels of oil last year, more than the previous year’s 154,336 million barrels.

However, the 2016 oil imports only amounted to $7.45 billion, a 13 percent decrease versus $8.61 billion in the previous year.

Of the total imports, 52.22 percent consist of finished products and 47.78 percent crude oil.