Cooking gas price under review
The Fuel Fund executive committee is preparing to review the subsidy on the retail price of household cooking gas, or LPG, which is due to expire on August 31.
The review will take account of the global LPG market price, the status of the Fuel Fund, and the cost of living for the public and businesses, in order to decide whether the price stabilisation for LPG should continue.
On June 30, the committee approved extending the price stabilisation measure for household cooking gas at 423 baht per 15-kg cylinder for an additional 2 months.
However, over the past two weeks, global LPG prices have increased significantly, going from more than US$400 per tonne to over $500 per tonne, leading to the latest compensation cost for the Fuel Fund of 4.39 baht per kg. Despite this, the overall income of the Fuel Fund remains positive and it is possible that the stabilisation programme will continue to avoid further burdening households.
As of August 20 of this year, the net Fuel Fund showed a deficit of 53.09 million baht, broken down into a negative balance of 44.72 billion baht for the LPG account and 8.36 billion baht for the oil account.
