Publication: Fuel Pricing and Subsidies in Indonesia : Reaching an Equitable and Sustainable Policy
Loading...
Published
2012
ISSN
Date
2013-03-14
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
Indonesia is an oil producing country and is the only East Asian member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). Over the years, this endowment of oil resources has been steadily exploited with substantial rents flowing to the government from production and exports of crude oil. The country is also one of the world's largest exporters of another petroleum resource, liquefied natural gas. The introduction of a new oil and gas law in 2001 (the law) provides the policy and legal basis for moving away from the present ineffective and fiscally inefficient fuel pricing and subsidy regime, towards the goal of an independent, reliable, transparent, competitive, efficient, and environmentally friendly petroleum sector that encourages the growth of the national potential and role and at the same time does not exclude the Government of Indonesia (GoI) fully meeting its social responsibility towards certain community groups. Implementation towards achieving the goals set out in the Law has been slow and hesitant. The Indonesian treasury is still saddled with a rather inefficient and ineffective fuel pricing and subsidies regime. This present report identifies a way forward for Indonesia to meet the requirements of the Law. That way forward will progressively eliminate the waste inherent in the present system, signal correct market behaviors to consumers, achieve large fiscal savings and help the economy grow while the any negative impact on the poor and vulnerable are cushioned. Chapter one tracks the recent history to the present situation in terms of petroleum fuels utilization, supply, pricing and subsidies, and identifies some of the key impacts of the prevailing policies. Chapter two identifies the target petroleum fuel market regime based on the goals established in the law, evaluates where the present policy falls short, and proposes measures that will help Indonesia achieve the outcomes that are consistent with the law. Chapter three proposes a step-wise transition that will be required to transform the present regime and at the same time opening the oil products market to the beneficial forces of competition and restructuring Pertamina's downstream operations.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2012. Fuel Pricing and Subsidies in Indonesia : Reaching an Equitable and Sustainable Policy. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/12712 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Ghana LPG Gas Sector Study(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-02)This study forms part of a broader study by the Oil and Gas Policy Division(COCPO) to identify reasons for the Liquid Petroleum Gas market (LPG market) failure in some selected countries, including Ghana. It is sequel to a similar study carried out in Nigeria in 2002. It is expected that lessons learned from the Nigeria study will be cautiously applied to other countries that are likely to benefit from similar investigative and analytical work. The objectives of this study are to investigate and identify impediments to LPG market development in Ghana; develop a strategy for market take-off / expansion for Ghana s domestic LPG market; expand access to LPG by all, including the poor in Ghana. The target is to achieve a per capita LPG consumption equivalent to the average of other West African countries which, according to data available from a World Bank/ World LPG Association (WLPGA) study for West Africa, has been estimated to be on the order of 3.7 kg. Another recent study, the UN Millennium Project, recommends, inter alia, that countries should ensure that at least 50% of households currently using traditional biomass for cooking be provided with easier access to modern cooking fuels by 2015, if they are to achieve their Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).Publication Sub-Saharan Africa Refinery Project, Volume II-A : Refinery Study(Washington, DC, 2009-09)The Sub-Saharan Africa Refinery Study evaluates the effects of improved fuel specifications on refiningoperations and air quality in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The improved fuel specifications would reduce the levels of certain pollutants in fuels, in turn reducing human exposure to these pollutants in ambient air. The health study estimates the health impacts and associated monetary benefits associated with the proposed improvements in fuel quality. The estimated monetary benefits will be compared to the costs to the refining industry associated with a change in fuel specifications, by region, as presented in Volume II,the Refinery StudyPublication Petroleum Product Pricing and Complementary Policies : Experience of 65 Developing Countries Since 2009(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-04)Unable to cope fully with steadily climbing world oil prices since mid-2009, many of the 65 countries reviewed in this paper have progressed slowly or even reversed course in reforming pricing of petroleum products. End-user prices in July 2012 varied by two orders of magnitude across the countries. More than two-fifths, including some that had only recently adopted automatic pricing mechanisms, froze the prices of gasoline, diesel, or both for months or even years on end during the study period. When the prices were finally adjusted, the increases were sometimes substantial, leading to large-scale protests, partial or full reversals of price adjustments, or softening of pricing reform policy. Governments' attempts to keep domestic prices artificially low -- through price control, export or quantity restrictions, or political pressure put on oil companies -- have helped curb inflation in the short term, but frequently with serious negative consequences: flourishing black markets, smuggling, fuel adulteration, illegal diversion of subsidy funds, large financial losses suffered by fuel suppliers, deteriorating refining and other infrastructure, and acute fuel shortages causing economy-wide damage. In several countries, subsidies, price controls, and other restrictions have helped protect inefficient refineries and oil marketers. Mitigation responses have included fuel conservation programs; fuel diversification, particularly liquid biofuels to substitute gasoline and diesel; and efforts to lower costs of supply, including strengthening infrastructure, promoting price competition, hedging, negotiating price discounts with exporters, and bulk procurement. Various forms of assistance to consumers have also been offered, especially to households, agriculture, transport, and fisheries.Publication Petroleum Product Markets in Sub-Saharan Africa : Comparative Efficiency Analysis of 12 Countries(Washington, DC, 2011-01-01)Petroleum products are used across the entire economy in every country. Gasoline and diesel are the primary fuels used in road transport. Oil is used in power generation, accounting for eleven percent of total electricity generated in Africa in 2007. Adequate and reliable supply of transport services and electricity in turn are essential for economic development. Households use a variety of petroleum products: kerosene is used for lighting, cooking, and heating; liquefied petroleum gas for cooking and heating; and gasoline and diesel for private vehicles as well as captive power generation. Prices users pay for these petroleum products have macroeconomic and microeconomic consequences. At the macroeconomic level, oil price levels can affect the balance of payments, gross domestic product (GDP), and, where fuel prices are subsidized, government budgets, contingent liabilities, or both. At the microeconomic level, higher oil prices lower effective household income in three ways. First, households pay more for petroleum products they consume directly. Seventy percent of Sub-Saharan Africans are not yet connected to electricity; most without access rely on kerosene for lighting. Second, higher oil prices increase the prices of all other goods that have oil as an intermediate input. The most significant among them for the poor in low-income countries is food, on which the poor spend a disproportionately high share of total household expenditures. Food prices increase because of higher transport costs and higher prices of such inputs to agriculture as fertilizers and diesel used for operating tractors and irrigation pumps. For the urban poor that use public transport, higher transport costs also decrease their effective income. Third, to the extent that higher oil prices lower GDP growth, household income is reduced.Publication Petroleum Markets in Sub-Saharan Africa : Analysis and Assessment of 12 Countries(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2010-03)This regional study takes twelve oil-importing countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and asks the following two questions: does each stage in the supply chain, from import of crude oil or refined products to retail, seem to be efficiently run and are the efficiency gains passed on to end-users? And if not, what are the potential causes and possible means of remedying the problems? The study focuses on Burkina Faso, Cote d'Ivoire, Mali, Niger, and Senegal in West Africa and Botswana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda in East and Southern Africa, covering a wide range of conditions that affect price levels, such as the market size, geography (whether landlocked or coastal), existence of domestic refineries, degree of sector liberalization including pricing, and level of economic development.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication World Development Report 2009(World Bank, 2009)Places do well when they promote transformations along the dimensions of economic geography: higher densities as cities grow; shorter distances as workers and businesses migrate closer to density; and fewer divisions as nations lower their economic borders and enter world markets to take advantage of scale and trade in specialized products. World Development Report 2009 concludes that the transformations along these three dimensions density, distance, and division are essential for development and should be encouraged. The conclusion is controversial. Slum-dwellers now number a billion, but the rush to cities continues. A billion people live in lagging areas of developing nations, remote from globalizations many benefits. And poverty and high mortality persist among the world’s bottom billion, trapped without access to global markets, even as others grow more prosperous and live ever longer lives. Concern for these three intersecting billions often comes with the prescription that growth must be spatially balanced. This report has a different message: economic growth will be unbalanced. To try to spread it out is to discourage it to fight prosperity, not poverty. But development can still be inclusive, even for people who start their lives distant from dense economic activity. For growth to be rapid and shared, governments must promote economic integration, the pivotal concept, as this report argues, in the policy debates on urbanization, territorial development, and regional integration. Instead, all three debates overemphasize place-based interventions. Reshaping Economic Geography reframes these debates to include all the instruments of integration spatially blind institutions, spatially connective infrastructure, and spatially targeted interventions. By calibrating the blend of these instruments, today’s developers can reshape their economic geography. If they do this well, their growth will still be unbalanced, but their development will be inclusive.Publication Poverty Reduction in Indonesia : Constructing a New Strategy(Washington, DC, 2001-10-29)The objective of the report is to point at the need for a new poverty strategy, and the areas of action it should cover, where each area should be specifically discussed, addressing the lives of Indonesia's poor, and the tradeoffs policymakers will need to consider, based on the belief that this poverty strategy should emerge from a broad dialogue among stakeholders. First, in broadening poverty, the report looks at the facts of the late 1990s crisis, which revealed the precariousness of Indonesia's gains in reducing expenditure-based poverty. Thus to extend those gains, the poverty strategy needs to be defined, and then redeveloped by acknowledging the multidimensional reality of poverty, and, it is this notion which will lead to making the strategic choices. Second, within the country's political transition to a democratic, decentralized mode of governance, a poverty strategy needs to be consistent with an empowered populace, and democratic policymaking mechanisms. In creating a policy environment for raising the incomes of the poor, the report identifies the resumption of rapid sustainable growth, with rising real wages, employment opportunities, and, limited inflation, including the economic empowerment of the poor, enhanced by poverty-focused public expenditures. Inevitably, the provision of core public services is an area which should address the people's will in local governance policies, focusing on education and health, while providing appropriate infrastructure, and developing safety nets.Publication Boom, Bust and Up Again? Evolution, Drivers and Impact of Commodity Prices: Implications for Indonesia(World Bank, Jakarta, 2010-12)Indonesia is one of the largest commodity exporters in the world, and given its mineral potential and expected commodity price trends, it could and should expand its leading position. Commodities accounted for one fourth of Indonesia's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and more than one fifth of total government revenue in 2007. The potential for further commodity growth is considerable. Indonesia is the largest producer of palm oil in the world (export earnings totaled almost US$9 billion in 2007 and employment 3.8 million full-time jobs) and the sector has good growth prospects. It is also one of the countries with the largest mining potential in view of its second-largest copper reserves and third-largest coal and nickel reserves in the world. This report consists of seven chapters. The first six chapters present an examination and an analysis of the factors driving increased commodity prices, price forecasts, economic impact of commodity price increases, effective price stabilization policies, and insights from Indonesia's past growth experience. The final chapter draws on the findings of the previous chapters and suggests a development strategy for Indonesia in the context of high commodity prices. This section summarizes the contents of the chapters and their main findings.Publication World Development Report 2004(World Bank, 2003)Too often, services fail poor people in access, in quality, and in affordability. But the fact that there are striking examples where basic services such as water, sanitation, health, education, and electricity do work for poor people means that governments and citizens can do a better job of providing them. Learning from success and understanding the sources of failure, this year’s World Development Report, argues that services can be improved by putting poor people at the center of service provision. How? By enabling the poor to monitor and discipline service providers, by amplifying their voice in policymaking, and by strengthening the incentives for providers to serve the poor. Freedom from illness and freedom from illiteracy are two of the most important ways poor people can escape from poverty. To achieve these goals, economic growth and financial resources are of course necessary, but they are not enough. The World Development Report provides a practical framework for making the services that contribute to human development work for poor people. With this framework, citizens, governments, and donors can take action and accelerate progress toward the common objective of poverty reduction, as specified in the Millennium Development Goals.Publication Impact Evaluation in Practice, Second Edition(Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank and World Bank, 2016-09-13)The second edition of the Impact Evaluation in Practice handbook is a comprehensive and accessible introduction to impact evaluation for policy makers and development practitioners. First published in 2011, it has been used widely across the development and academic communities. The book incorporates real-world examples to present practical guidelines for designing and implementing impact evaluations. Readers will gain an understanding of impact evaluations and the best ways to use them to design evidence-based policies and programs. The updated version covers the newest techniques for evaluating programs and includes state-of-the-art implementation advice, as well as an expanded set of examples and case studies that draw on recent development challenges. It also includes new material on research ethics and partnerships to conduct impact evaluation. The handbook is divided into four sections: Part One discusses what to evaluate and why; Part Two presents the main impact evaluation methods; Part Three addresses how to manage impact evaluations; Part Four reviews impact evaluation sampling and data collection. Case studies illustrate different applications of impact evaluations. The book links to complementary instructional material available online, including an applied case as well as questions and answers. The updated second edition will be a valuable resource for the international development community, universities, and policy makers looking to build better evidence around what works in development.