Inflation improves but petrol price does not

The Department of Minerals and Energy has announced that the petrol price is set to rise again on Wednesday the 2nd of September 2009 by 36 cents per litre. This is a whopping rise and may dampen any optimism caused by inflation falling. This rise will feed into the September inflation figures which are due out at the end of October 2009. Inflation has been steadily falling and is now within sight of the target band of 3 to 6 percent at 6.7 percent. Petrol is a major component of inflation and this is what the rise will cost you to fill your tank.

• City Golf 49 litre tank = R 17.64 more
• BMW 70 litre tank = R 25.20 more
• Hilux 160 litre tank = R 57.60 more

These results are averaged across ULP and LRP and the coastal and inland price variations creating a base line of R 7.515 per litre, compared to a new average price of R 7.875 per litre. These amounts may seem small but they add up and increase your monthly expenses. Inflation figures have a time lag from when they are actually happening to when they are published, and what people spend on is determined by a large part by what they think they can afford. These price increases may lead to people offsetting a little something in favour of making sure they can get to work each day.

When you plan a budget it allows you to see what you have to spend on and then how much extra spending money you have left over, the petrol price increase will cause your spending money to decline. According to the Automobile Association there are 9.8 million vehicles on the road in South Africa. So if we took the average price increase as R 33.48, it is going to cost a massive R 328 104 000.00, yes R 328 million extra and that is just using an average of a small, medium and large car. Big trucks have massive fuel tanks and we can expect the cost of transport to jump given this price hike. These are scary figures that may just raise inflation again.