The Philippine Departments of Foreign Affairs and Energy were instructed Friday to exert all diplomatic efforts to seek cheaper and more stable oil supply to avert an oil crisis the country is suffering.

The order was issued by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo during the signing ceremony of a memorandum of agreement between oil companies and the Department of Energy on energy conversation measures.

"This is a strategic global problem. We must act globally and locally," Arroyo said.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo assured the president that he would draft an all-out program with Energy Secretary Raphael Lotilla on how to approach the different countries to ensure a cheaper and stale supply for the Philippines.

Romulo said that the president has as early as April warned of a global recession and called on world leaders to act on the upsurge of oil prices in the world market during the Asia-Africa Summit in Jakarta, Indonesia.

The president has also brought up the oil issue with the Saudi Oil Minister Ali Bin Ibrahim Alnaimi and the Gambian President Alhaji Yahya Jammeh, when the two visited the country earlier this year, he said.

According to the foreign secretary, Saudi Arabia, which is the home of one quarter of the world's oil reserve, remains the Philippines' main source of oil.

Russia, among others, is targeted by the Philippines as the potential energy source, he added.

As one of the solutions to the oil crisis, President Arroyo has reduced the tariff on imported oil and would eliminate its excise taxes should the expanded value added tax law takes effect.

She also cut the import duty on bioethanol fuel in support of the government's energy independence agenda, which is to realize 60 percent energy self-supply by 2010.

Source: Xinhua