BUDAPEST, July 30 (Xinhua) -- Hungarian government decided to restrict access to fuel price caps and release a quarter of the national strategic fuel reserve to guarantee the security of supply, the head of the Prime Minister's officer Gergely Gulyas said here on Saturday at an extraordinary press conference.
The new restriction comes into effect Saturday at noon.
"At the suggestion of MOL (Hungary's largest oil company), the government decided to keep the guaranteed price of 480 forints (1.21 U.S. dollars) exclusively for privately owned vehicles, taxis and agricultural machinery," Gulyas said.
The tightening of measures is necessary because the Szazlombatta refinery of MOL will undergo maintenance and will not be able to keep up with domestic needs.
A quarter of the national strategic reserve will be released, but this is only to cover part of the needs, the rest must be covered by imports, according to Gulyas.
On Friday, MOL CEO Zsolt Hernadi warned that if the price cap on fuel remains unchanged, no imported fuel would arrive in the country.
Hungary needs imports, but because of the official price, it is not profitable to import fuel from abroad. However, without imports there will be a shortage, according to Hernadi.
The current market price for a liter of 95 gasoline is currently 692.9 forints, and 737.9 forints for diesel.
The government capped the price of petrol and diesel per liter at 480 forints from November 15 last year to October 1 this year. (1 forint = 0.0025 U.S. dollars) ■