Here is the official petrol price for September – including a surprise levy

The Department of Mineral Resources and Energy has published the official fuel price adjustments for September, showing a nasty shock for petrol consumers in South Africa.

Mid- and end-month data published by the Central Energy Fund for August pointed a price cut across the board for fuel – however, adjustments to the slate levy and a retail margin increase for petrol mean that motorists will be paying more per litre from Wednesday.

Without the retail margin increase and slate levy adjustments, fuel prices would have come down by 11 cents per litre for petrol, and 24 cents per litre for diesel. However, with the additional adjustments, petrol prices will now see an increase of 4 cents per litre, while diesel prices will be cut by 14 and 15 cents per litre.

• Petrol 95: increase of 4 cents per litre;
• Petrol 93: increase of 4 cents per litre;
• Diesel 0.05%: decrease of 15 cents per litre;
• Diesel 0.005%: decrease of 14 cents per litre;
• Illuminating Paraffin: decrease of 15 cents per litre.

Movement in prices is typically affected by two main factors – international petroleum costs, and the movement in the rand/dollar exchange rate.

The average international product prices for petrol, diesel and illuminating paraffin decreased during the period under review.

The rand depreciated against the US dollar during the period under review, on average, when compared to the previous period. The average rand/US dollar exchange rate for the period 30 July 2021 to 26 August 2021 was 14.7791 compared to 14.5359 during the previous period.

This led to a higher contribution to the Basic Fuel Prices on petrol, diesel and illuminating paraffin by 13.23 c/l, 12.16 c/l and 11.96 c/l respectively.

However, minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe has approved a retail margin increase of 5.7 c/l to be effected in the retail price structures of all octane grades of petrol in September. This increase is necessary to accommodate the wage increases of pump attendants, cashiers and administrative staff at service stations, he said.

Added to this, the combined cumulative petrol and diesel slate balances at the end of July 2021 amounted to a negative balance of R1.736 billion.

In line with the provisions of the Self-Adjusting Slate Levy Mechanism, a Slate Levy of 15.36 c/l (an increase of 8.78 c/l) will be implemented into the price structures of petrol and diesel with effect from 1 September 2021, the department said.

This is how the price changes are expected to reflect at the pumps:

Read: Motorists can expect some petrol price relief next week