Gasoline Prices To Drop!
The Autoridad Reguladora de Servicios Públicos (ARESEP) - regulating body on public prices and services - yesterday approved a decrease - yes, a decrease - in the price of gasoline.

The price reduction was requested by the Refinadora Costarricense de Petróleo (RECOPE) - the state oil refinery and distributor - that will see the price of a litre of regular gasoline drop ¢24 colones from the current ¢405 colones (us$0.86) to ¢381 colones (us$0.81).

Super gasoline will drop ¢25 colones a litre and deisel ¢20 colones.

This will be the first drop in the price of gasoline for this year following four consecutive increases that saw gasoline prices jump more than ¢40 colones since January of this year.

For the price drop to come into effect, the approval has to published in the official government newspaper La Gaceta, which is expected by the end of the this week, as early as Friday.

The government has been under extreme pressure by different interest groups calling for a reduction in the price of gasoline. RECOPE said the price hikes were a direct result of the high cost of crude oil on world markets, which exceeded us$50 a barrel this year, and feared it would hit us$60 in the coming months.