KATADATA ? PT Pertamina (Persero) said that they are currently re-considering the plan to build the fuel refinery. One of the reasons is because the company keeps on suffering from the losses of fuel sales.
The financial performance report of Pertamina up until the first semester of this year has recorded a net profit of US$ 570 million or equivalent to IDR 7.5 trillion (for the rate of IDR 13,000 per dollar) However, this number is 50% lower compared to the net profit from the same period last year, which could reach US$ 1.13 billion or equivalent to IDR 13.5 trillion.
The Main Director of Pertamina, Dwi Soetjipto, said that one of the reasons why the net profit is declining is because of the losses from the downstream sector. Since April up until July this year, Pertamina has admitted that they suffered a total loss of IDR 12.7 trillion from the sales of fuel.
According to Dwi, the formulation of the fuel price that is set by the government is not economically realistic. The problem here is that the government has no longer given any subsidy for Premium type of fuel, and this has caused Pertamina to deal with the IDR 1,000 price difference per liter.
The suitable economic price for Premium should reach IDR 8,300 per liter. However, the government held it to still be at IDR 7,400 per liter. The price hasn?t changed until today.
To balance the financial scale, Pertamina need to conduct efficiency. ?We?re doing efficiency with breakthrough project as the basis to attain profit,? said Dwi in Jakarta, (5/8).
The condition like this has made Pertamina to be reluctant in building refinery. The Marketing Director of Pertamina, Ahmad Bambang, said that currently his side is having a difficult time whether to continue the plan for the refinery or not.
On one side, the government has forced Pertamina to build refinery, even though the financial performance of Pertamina is not doing any better. Even the government currently is planning to appoint Pertamina directly to build the refinery.
But on the other side, Pertamina has also been forced to deal with the losses coming from the fuel sales that are below the economic price. ?If we are told to deal with losses like this, how can we build refinery?? said Bambang.
Pertamina also expects the government to be able to give solution over this matter. The suggestion is that the government can still set the fuel price below the economic normal price, and then release a policy that would support Pertamina to gain a bigger fund to build the refinery.
One of the things that is hoped by Pertamina as a reward to cover up the losses is by decreasing or supporting the dividend transfers to the government. This has also been suggested to the State-owned Enterprises Ministry by Pertamina.
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