Tomorrow the Russian government will consider abolition of duties on products of PSA
Release Date: 2011-07-13
On July 14 Presidency the Russian Government will consider the federal law draft, which will provide exemption from customs duty for exported products owned by members of a production sharing agreement (PSA).
At the present time in Russia there are three projects for the extraction of hydrocarbons - Kharyaga, "Sakhalin-1" and "Sakhalin-2" which are under production-sharing agreements.
"Considering the principles of the current law on PSAs, which establishes the possibility of the Russian Federation profiting from the sale of PSAs, thereby charging the investor to sell the product owed by the State and transfer the full proceeds from its sale to the budget system. Collection of customs duties for these products is redundant, since not only does it not increase revenue, but also entails a significant increase in the number of administrative procedures "- the document says.
The project is proposed to amend article 35 of the Federal Law "On Customs Tariff", granting exemptions from customs duties, as well as in article 37 of the Act, providing for exclusion of duplicate rules on the possibility of granting tariff concessions in the form of return of previously paid taxes, reduced rate of duty and exemption of exceptional cases, the fee the investor exported products.
In addition, the bill proposes to amend the federal law "On production sharing agreements", which allows the preparation and implementation of PSAs to take into account the special procedure of calculation and payment of mandatory "non-tax" payments, which are covered by the tax or customs laws, and other legislative Acts of the Russian Federation, in particular the law "On Subsoil" - for the use of natural resources.
The head of the Russian Energy Ministry said in June that there are no plans to enter production-sharing agreements. An exception is a project to develop Khvalynskoye field in the Caspian Sea, where the PSA regime is provided by an intergovernmental agreement with Kazakhstan.
The project "Sakhalin-1" includes the development of the Chayvo, Odoptu and Arkutun Dagi, the potential recoverable reserves are estimated at 307 million tonnes (2.3 billion barrels) and 485 billion cubic meters (17 trillion cubic feet). Participants in "Sakhalin-1", other than the operator of the project - the American Exxon, are "Rosneft" (20%), Indian ONGC (20%) and Japan's Sodeco (30%).
The project "Sakhalin-2" develops the Piltun-Astokhskoye and Lunskoye regions, where recoverable reserves are estimated at 150 million tons of oil and 500 billion cubic meters of gas. Shareholders are: "Gazprom" (50% plus one share), Royal Dutch Shell (27,5%) and Japanese Mitsui (12,5%) and Mitsubishi (10%). The operator of the project is a consortium Sakhalin Energy.
Kharyaga field in the Nenets Autonomous District, developed under a production sharing agreement that was concluded in December 20, 1995 for a period of 29 years and might be extended to 33 years, came in force on 12 February 1999. Total reserves of the oil field are estimated at 160.4 million tons. After entering "Zarubezhneft" Kharyaga project in the proportion of shareholders in it are: the French Total - 40%, Norwegian Statoil - 30%, "Zarubezhneft" - 20%, Nenets Oil Company - 10%. As reported on OilGasField.ru with a reference to RIA "Novosti".
| Type: | NORMAL |
| Url: | http://www.oilcapital.ru/news/2011/07/131746_169936.shtml |