Tariffs For Transit Of Russian Oil Sharply Increased

According to the new decree, the cost of oil transit will increase for Russia from 1 February.

Belarus raises tariffs for the transit of Russian oil through its territory from 1 February. The decree of the Ministry of Antimonopoly Regulation and Trade of 30 December 2016 states this. The decree was published on the national legal Internet portal on January 5.

The document states that the transportation of oil through the main pipelines of JSC "Gomeltransneft Druzhba" along the route Unecha (Vysokaye) - Adamova Zastava will cost 287.90 rubles per ton excluding VAT (previously 267.32 rubles). Transportation of one ton of oil along the route Unecha (Vysokaye) - Brody will cost 123.66 rubles (previously 114.82 rubles).

The new tariffs will apply from 1 February till 31 March 2017.

The last time when the tariffs for the transportation of Russian oil via Belarus rose was 1 February 2016.

In October 2016 Belarus unilaterally decided to raise the tariff for transit of Russian oil by 1.5 times. The document was to enter into force on 11 October 2016. However, on October 10, Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus Uladzimir Siamashka said that Belarus had canceled the decision to raise the tariffs for the transit of Russian oil in exchange for the recovery of the volume of oil supplies from Russia to Belarus.

In late December last year, Advisor to the President of "Transneft" Igor Demin said that the Russian company considered the increase in tariffs for pumping oil through Belarus to be economically justified. Demin explained that he was talking about the increase of prices for oil transit via "Gomeltransneft Druzhba" by 5.8% and via "Polotsktransneft Druzhba" by 11.76%.

In turn, chairman of the Belneftekhim Concern Ihar Liashenka said that the tariff for oil transit was negotiated during a meeting of the Belarusian delegation with representatives of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of Russia on December 27.

"We provided our justifications and expressed the desire to increase the tariff by 20.5%," – the chairman of "Belneftekhim" said on December 28.

Supplies of Russian oil to Belarus reduced by 20.3% in 2016 and amounted to 18.148 million tons. Experts say that such a reduction is critical to the economy of Belarus.

In 2016, export of oil products from Belarus fall by several billion dollars (by 38%).