TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The government is preparing to anticipate the surge of energy subsidy budget within the 2018 State Budget. The Finance Ministry's budgetary director general Askolani said it one of the steps is to prepare an additional Rp30 trillion to add to the energy subsidy allocation.
"We monitor the state budget's actuated numbers each month; both in revenue, expenditure and financing," Askolani told Tempo in Jakarta, Monday, March 26.
Meanwhile, the ministry's director of budgetary preparation Kunta Wibawa said that the additional funds came from the reserves of various sectors. These include an allocation of urgent spending expenditure budget of Rp25 trillion. The existence of this post, Kunta said, allows the government to skip the process of revising the state budget despite an increase in spending.
The subsidy raise is prompted by the increase of world oil prices that exceeded the government's state budget assumption, which was pegged at US$ 48 a barrel, with a currency exchange assumption of Rp13,400/US$. As of March, the average crude price has reached US$60 per barrel.
In the 2018 State Budget, the total subsidy energy amounted to Rp94.53 trillion.
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives' (DPR) Energy Commission member Satya Widya Yudha said that energy subsidy will continue to increase if oil prices remain on an uptrend.
ADITYA BUDIMAN | ROBBY IRFANY | ADITYA BUDIMAN
