Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The government has set itself a target of saving up to Rp35.34 trillion net from its kerosene-to-gas conversion program, a senior gas and oil official said.

Director General for Oil and Gas of the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM), Evita Legowo said here on Thursday that the total amount of money that could be economized from the conversion program since 2007 to 2011 was estimated at Rp49.46 trillion.

"But after it was reduced by first package cost worth Rp14.11 trillion, the accumulative subsidy efficiency amounted to Rp35.34 trillion net," she said.

She said that the initial target to finish the conversion program was in 2012 but it was later shortened to 2010. "However, we can`t finish it so that we hope it would be completed in 2011 this year," she added.

The director general said after completing its conversion program the government continued a distribution mechanism carried out not openly so that it would be more accurate in reaching the target.

She said that the realization of saved subsidy in the conversion program up to the fourth week of December 2010 reached Rp26.63 trillion.

The value was obtained from the economization of Rp38.14 trillion minus first package cost amounting to Rp11.51 trillion.

In the meantime, the total economization target in 2011 was Rp11.32 trillion with a package cost of Rp2.6 trillion so that the total net subsidy to be saved would amount to Rp8.71 trillion.

The first package distribution of gas reached 48.13 million units with a gas volume of 5.187 million tons and the withdrawal of kerosene of 7.624 million kiloliters.

The target for 2011 is to distribute 9.29 packages with a volume of gas of 3.55 million tons and withdrawal of kerosene of 7.657 million kiloliters.
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Editor: Bambang
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