We hope you’re prepared to be disappointed. It’s that time of the month again – time to see what horrors the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy has in store for the country’s petrol pumps. Don’t judge our cynicism too harshly, we invite you to check out the last one of these and it’ll make sense.

It’s not all bad news, however. The Central Energy Fund (CEF) — the state-owned energy company responsible for keeping an eye on the country’s fuel prices — has blessed us with a fresh batch of data (captured 22 February) that’s predicting a moderately more bearable outcome for the petrol pumps at the beginning of March.

Don’t get us wrong. We aren’t promising you’ll be leaving here happy after seeing the CEF’s predictions. But we can promise it’ll be slightly more uplifting than the R1.50+ price hikes that have been on the cards for a while.

Bad news, everyone!

It’s worth noting that the prices below aren’t the ones we’ll see at the pumps on Wednesday, 6 March. Those have yet to be decided by the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy — which it will do at the end of the month. Until then, the CEF’s predictions are all we’ve got to go on. That doesn’t mean they’re not accurate — and a valuable resource.

See, the CEF looks at all the same data that the Department does to arrive at its predictions. That means keeping an eye out for the current Rand/US Dollar exchange rate and the price of oil internationally. The only thing the CEF can’t account for is the Department’s monthly changes to the slate levy and retail margin — which has been known to add a good few cents into the mix.