FOLLOWING a series of rollbacks in the previous weeks, fuel prices may reverse to upward movement in the coming week, the Department of Energy (DoE) said on Friday.

During the Laging Handa public briefing, Rino Abad, director of DoE’s Oil Industry Management Bureau, said the prices of diesel may go up by around P4 per liter, while gasoline may increase by less than P1 per liter. Likewise, kerosene prices may rise by about P2 per liter.

“These are estimates for the time being as we’re still waiting for the announcement of the companies,”Abad said.

The expected price increase in petroleum products follows the recent decision of the OPEC+, the coalition of oil-producing nations led by Russia and Saudi Arabia, to slash oil production by 2 million barrels per day.

OPEC Plus, a group of 23 oil-exporting countries that meets regularly to decide how much crude oil to sell on the world market, on Wednesday agreed on their first large production cut in more than two years in a bid to raise prices.

“The effect of the decision of OPEC is to remove oversupply that results in consecutive rollbacks. Their reason is to stabilize prices, which means they do not want the prices of crude oil to go down,”Abad said in Filipino.

Brent crude is now at $94.81 per barrel as of last October 7, a 22.9-percent decline from over $123 per barrel in mid-June.

West Texas Intermediate price slightly went up by 0.36 percent to $88.77 per barrel while Dubai crude was at $92.12 per barrel.

“They do not want prices to go down to $90 per barrel. According to analysts, their plan is to increase it to $100 to $110 per barrel,”said Abad in Filipino.

On Tuesday, oil firms reduced the prices of gasoline by P0.40 per liter, diesel by P0.45 per liter and kerosene by P0.85 per liter.

Industry experts attributed the decline in oil prices in the world market to a weak demand outlook.