The recent government decision to increase the price of natural gas, petrol and diesel by RM0.30 has caused shock and uproar among all Malaysians in anticipation of across-the-board increases for all items related with transportation cost increases.

There are no long-term solutions to curb our oil addiction with alternative fuels. We read with great interest newspaper reports on the Multiple Bio-Diesel Projects, but unfortunately those are for export markets only. And only five percent is planned to be blended with fossil diesel for use locally in Malaysia.

I think this mere 5% of planned usage is a great mistake and it should be increased further to assist the mass usage of bio-diesel and reduce the usage of the fossil diesel to the bare minimum with a more aggressive plan to reduce our dependance on fossil oil. In addition, there are no plans made by the authorities to use alternative fuels to replace the existing usage of petrol.

The savings in subsidies as a result of fuel price increase should be used by the government in a viable plan to replace petrol with 'E85' which is a blend of 85% bio-ethanol and 15% petrol that is now used quite widely in Brazil, the US and Europe and very soon in China. Bio-ethanol could be produced from biomass, tapioca, wastes from food sources or wastes from wood industries.

Oil prices are determined by global oil demand and supply whereas local production of bio-diesel and bio-ethanol will be determined by local production efficiencies based on mass production, thereby creating economy of scales.