No grounds to postpone tax maneuver in oil industry - Novak
MOSCOW. Dec 22 (Interfax) - There are no grounds to postpone the tax maneuver in the oil industry, due to begin on January 1, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said in an interview with the Rossiya 24 TV channel.
Asked whether the possibility of delaying the tax maneuver until better times was being considered, he said: "No, it's not being discussed." "The tax maneuver is the consolidated position of all federal agencies, a decision reached by the government, which is designed above all to improve the situation in the oil and gas industry. To talk about rolling the decision back would not be progress, and we have no grounds to do so," he said.
Novak said the tax maneuver was adopted to redistribute subsidies between upstream and downstream, to minimize the system for charging customs duties and to convert these to taxation, and to step up the development of new fields and develop ageing fields effectively. "This is a maneuver that is only intended to improve things. It will take only a few years to carry out, it'll be very fast. We could stretch it out over ten years, but that would be ineffective because the situation can alter over such a long time," Novak said.
