Winnipeggers fuel up with cheap gas as Canadian dollar dips

WINNIPEG – Winnipeggers were busy fuelling up Wednesday as the price of gas hit a three-year low.

“Oh it’s nice, always nice to save a few dollars; it’s great,” said one customer.

The price of gas hovered around $1.06 per litre Wednesday across the city, but there’s also a downside.

“When the price of oil falls, Canada doesn’t quite look as good on the market and so the market is pricing that now and the dollar is falling,” said Michael Benarroch, dean of the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba.

The Canadian dollar has tumbled to a five-year low of under 88 cents U.S.

That means the cost of fruits and vegetables and other imported products will rise, as well as your pre-Christmas shopping trip to North Dakota.

“I don’t really care if it costs a little more to go down, it’s still something we enjoy doing,” said one shopper.

“People are going to be more careful about how they spend their money. Your vacation now just became 10 per cent more expensive,” said Benarroch.

“I’ll stay here. I’d rather stay here. Going down there, getting a hotel, getting a babysitter — it’s just cheaper and easier to stay here,” said another shopper.

And even though oil prices are falling, Air Canada is still making passengers pay a fuel surcharge for international flights. The charge was added when oil was trading at $100 per barrel in 2008; today’s price is $79 per barrel.

“We need to see prices remaining relatively low, at $75 to 80 per barrel for a few months, in order for companies to change their behaviour,” said Benjamin Tai, deputy chief economist at CIBC.