Belarus is obliged to pay the customs duty of ca. $270 from every tonne of exported oil products, but exporting solvents Belarust is obliged to pay... nothing.

The schemes of shadow export of Russian oil products under the guise of solvents and thinners were developed to receive superprofit and speed up country’s GDP growth. The fact is confirmed by the National Statistics Committee Belstat data.

According to the statistics, Belarus exported 2.87mln tonnes of solvents and thinners worth $2.526bln in the H1, 2012. Almost all solvents and thinners — 2.869mln tonnes — were exported to the EU.

The export to the Netherlands counted $1.324mln tonnes, to Latvia — $1.278mln tonnes, to Lithuania — 254k tonnes, http://afn.by/news/i/170954 says.

Still, Belarusian economy needs real solvents and thinners which are not produced in Belarus and imported. Thus, Belarus imported 2.335k tonnes of complex organic solvents worth only $5.3mln in the H1, 2012.

If average import and export prices are compared, one may notice that every tonne of exported solvents costs $880, which is “accidentally” so close to the price of exported oil products which is $860 per tonne.

However, every tonne of real solvents imported in Belarus costs $2,300.

Here we should remind that Belarus is obliged to pay the customs duty of ca. $270 from every tonne of exported Russian oil products. However, if Belarus exports solvents and thinners, it is obliged to pay... nothing.

Currently, Russia ceased shipments of its oil products to Belarus and tries to investigate the shadow business.

The way the investigation is going to influence Russia–Belarus relations and the conditions of shipments of crude naphtha to Belarus in particular, is going to be decided by the governments of the two countries. Probably, Moscow will decide on punishment for Belarus which caused the losses of $1.1bln in the H1, 2012.

At the same time, so-called production of solvents and thinners made a considerable input in Belarus’ GDP growth: up 2.8% within 2012’s first seven months.

nn.by