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Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Carvajal: Our wasteful ways
By Orlando P. Carvajal
Market forces, the tug and pull of supply and demand, determine the price of oil. Since we do not produce oil to any remarkable degree, we are not in a position to influence the short supply that is currently driving prices up. No amount of protest will bring the prices of oil down either and protesters are really only using the situation to advance their political agenda.
That does not mean we are helpless since there are ways we can help ourselves, like changing, and in a big way, our wasteful ways.
Reducing the gas allowances of government officials and bureaucrats is definitely a move in the right direction because admittedly this is the most wasteful sector of the gas-consuming population. It will not cut down so much on “official use only” as it would on the “personal use also” of government vehicles. To be sure, however, government vehicles should be garaged for the weekend.
Cutting the government workweek to four days is a move in the direction of fuel cost savings. Government offices are notoriously wasteful of time that I will not be surprised if what they now accomplish in five days can easily be done in four days. Coming in late, getting off early and loitering in between are normal behavior in many government offices.
How about cutting down also on bureaucracy and save the poor citizen from having to go back to the same office many times to get their business done?
Meanwhile, in our city streets, jeepneys and buses are wasting a lot of gas with their stop-and-go operation. God only knows how many times a jeepney goes back to first gear in between stop lights and how much fuel this wastes because passengers get on and off a jeepney where they want.
The government can add more designated on-off points for jeepneys and strictly enforce these. Passengers can learn to walk to the designated pick-up spot, get down on the designated stopping spot and walk the few meters to where they’re going. The walk not only saves gas, it is also good for the health.
Car-pooling of private vehicles can be done by many of us without waiting for the government to mandate them in designated streets.
Voluntary car-pooling even saves more because we can use car pool on any street.
I’d like to end by suggesting that our local governments pave our streets evenly and smoothly. Unpaved or unevenly paved roads offer resistance to the roll of a vehicle’s tires necessitating more power, hence more gas, to push the vehicle forward. In fact, our bad roads waste gas, tires and other vehicle parts not to mention the motorist’s nerves.
Speaking of nerves, if we keep our cool we can think of many more ways to cut down on fuel cost.
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