If the international oil price rises 15 US dollars per barrel this year, then China will have to pay an additional 15 billion US dollars for buying oil, Niu Li, an economist with the State Information Center (SIC) said Wednesday.

China has the world's biggest trade deficit in oil import and export, so the soaring oil price this year has remarkably increased China's international payment, Niu said.

He estimated that China would import a total of 1 billion barrels of crude oil this year, saying the 15-dollar-per-barrel rise would cost the country another 15 billion US dollars.

The oil price hike also imposes burdens on China's individual consumers, because more families are buying autos, he said. In 1999, a hundred families in China only owned 0.34 cars on average,but in 2004, the figure rose to 2.2 cars.

Based on the weighted average price of oil products in the three markets in Singapore, Rotterdam and New York, the wholesale and retail price of China's oil products are determined and published by the State Development and Reform Commission according to the domestic market.

Since July 2003, China has seen seven rises of its oil product price.