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Oman plans fuel subsidy reform, spending cuts

By Ben Flanagan

Posted on December 31, 2015

Petroleum products to track global prices from mid-January

PHOTO: Oman fuel prices will start to track global trends from mid-January. Credit: Shutterstock

Oman plans to revise fuel prices from mid-January as part of a government drive to cut spending due to the slump in oil prices.

The price of petroleum and oil products will start to track global trends from mid-January, state news agency ONA reported. Oman currently has some of the lowest fuel prices in the world, due to expensive state subsidies.

The move to liberalise the market follows the UAE’s decision to cut fuel subsidies from August 2015, with monthly reviews of prices. This led to lower diesel prices, seen as a boost to the local construction industry.

Oman’s Council of Ministers, at its state budget meeting, approved several steps aimed at addressing the impact of the slump in oil prices.

“These procedures include cutting down government spending, developing non-oil revenues through raising the rates of taxes on the profits of companies and revising and raising fees payable against some government services, as well as revising the prices of petroleum products (oil products) in a manner that corresponds to global prices of those products with effect from mid-January 2016,” ONA reported.

Oman posted a budget deficit of 3.26 billion rials ($8.5 billion) in the first 10 months of this year, compared with a 189.6 million rial surplus a year earlier, according to Reuters.