Transportation officials Thursday confirmed that a fare increase at the Metro Rail Transit (MRT-3) is “inevitable” to allow operators to recover billions of pesos in losses.

MRT General Manager Reynaldo Berroya said the national government is considering increasing the current fare from P15 to P20 or P25 even before President Benigno Aquino III, in his State-of-the-Nation Address last Monday, assailed the government’s continued subsidy of MRT fares.

"(A fare hike) will amount to an additional income of around P1 billion annually," Berroya said, adding that the MRT-3 line, which runs along EDSA from Taft Avenue in Pasay City to North Avenue in Quezon City, only earns about P1.8 billion a year.

Transportation and Communication Secretary Jose de Jesus said a fare hike at MRT is justifiable since the MRT Development Corporation spends more than P5 billion a year for railway operations and maintenance.

"It's not recovering the cost of operations. I think it has to go up. I don't know how much," De Jesus said, adding that the fare hike will still have to undergo public hearing.

The government has been subsidizing the fare of the MRT, with the rate of P45 per passenger. Authorities said fares could have gone up to P60 without government subsidy.

If a fare hike is implemented, the transportation budgets of at least 400,000 daily MRT-3 passengers will be affected.

Meanwhile, the government is mulling to emulate the profitable mass transit system of Hong Kong to tow the Metro Manila’s railway system out of debt.

Secretary Herminio Coloma of the government communications group, said they will look into developing a “good business model” similar to Hong Kong’s mass transit railway system that provides affordable transport fares while remaining profitable for operators.

Coloma said developing a Hong Kong-style mass transit system would likewise help curb further government losses in the operations of the country’s railway systems. (with a report by Genalyn Kabiling)