The Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan should not create favourable conditions for illicit dealings through various “grey schemes”. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin issued this directive to his subordinates yesterday at a government meeting on customs regulation.
Before the meeting, the prime minister visited the Central Energy Customs. He watched for awhile as customs officers accepted declarations for oil and gas exports.
Andrei Belianinov, Russia’s chief customs officer, armed with a teacher’s pointer and ready to bury the prime minister in a pile of illustrative figures, looked more like a schoolboy at a blackboard giving a presentation.
“In 2009, our customs stations compiled documents on 209.5 million metric tons of crude oil and 48.5 million metric tons of petrochemicals,” Mr Belianinov said. He was speaking in a monotonous tone, while jerking the pointer around a diagram on a large display.
“Are there any problems?” Mr Putin asked, after hearing out Mr Belianinov’s plans to concentrate all customs procedures for fuel in the Central Energy Customs.
“Perhaps there are some with information resources, for we need interdepartmental information exchanges,” was Mr Belianinov’s prompt reply. “If we had an interdepartmental information centre combining the information resources of the Federal Customs Service, Transneft, and the railways, we could form a tough system of control over the levels and schedules of shipments.”
According to Mr Belianinov, this would guarantee a high level of payment collection. He suggested that the Energy Ministry should supervise this centre.
Inspired by what he had seen, the Prime Minister went to the House of Government, where he focused on more global problems of the Customs Union. Its establishment has forced Russia to tackle foreign trade regulation in a new way.
“We have had a uniform customs tariff and a system of non-tariff regulation since January 2010. In July, we must make another serious step forward – to put a Uniform Customs Code into effect,” the Prime Minister said.
This requires serious approaches to the structure of Russia’s relations with its Customs Union partners. According to Mr Putin, our government agencies must be able to coordinate their positions and promptly make the necessary decisions.
“We must move cautiously, stage-by-stage, and adapt our domestic legislation to the tasks set,” the Prime Minister advised. “For this purpose, proper control should be ensured at the external borders of the Customs Union. The emergence of ‘grey zones’ here that could be used by unscrupulous dealers posing as businessmen must be ruled out. At the same time, bona fide exporters must fully enjoy all the benefits of Customs Union integration.”
By Anastasia Savinykh