Australia's Qantas Airways lifted its fares for the second time in less than a month on Thursday in response to record high fuel prices.
Qantas plans to increase international fares by 4 percent and domestic fares by about 3 percent.
It also said it had increased its fuel hedging to cover 59 percent of expected crude oil requirements in 2008/09 at USD$111.81 a barrel.
US crude oil futures touched a record above USD$135 on Thursday, while jet fuel prices in Singapore hit USD$166 a barrel.
"Despite our hedging activities, fare increases, surcharges, and strong focus on managing costs across our operations, we will not cover these higher fuel costs, which at current prices will add more than AUD$2 billion to our fuel bill in 2008/09," Chief Executive Geoff Dixon said in a statement.
It also said it would look to cut costs further by reviewing its networks and schedules on Qantas, its regional service QantasLink and budget carrier Jetstar.
The move follows increases in late April of 3 percent on international routes and 3.5 percent on domestic ones.
Qantas spokesman Simon Rushton said the group still expected to achieve its target of 40 percent profit growth for the current year, which ends on June 30.
"You can assume that what we said in our last statement is still current," he said.
