In anticipation of the commissioning of the export duties on timber

According to ”the Pacific star”, for several months, loggers of the Khabarovsk territory and the entire Far East live and work in conditions of uncertainty. Since January 01, 2019, according to the decree of the government of the Russian Federation, a 40% duty on the export of roundwood for enterprises that do not have woodworking facilities is introduced. And this production is not about half of the logging edge: from the powerful Shelekhovsky timber industry to a small enterprise “Suluk” in the Verkhnebureinsky district.

According to the doctor of economic Sciences, chief researcher of the Institute of economic research of Feb RAS Natalia Antonova, “quotas for the export of roundwood at the rate of 6.5 %, according to last year’s government decree, have the right to obtain only enterprises, which have at least 20% of the total value of exports is processed products. In the far East, there are only a few such large companies. And from January 01, 2019, a quota with a duty of 25% will be re-introduced for enterprises with woodworking, against 6.5% of the current ones, as a measure of state support for the creation of woodworking in the far East. Thus, the export of roundwood becomes unprofitable, and therefore the procurement activities for export-oriented industry should be stopped. After the introduction of 25 percent duty, we have already lost the Japanese market. Now we can lose Chinese too.”

No wonder the 40-percent duty is called prohibitive: the company is either forced to raise the price of its products, making it uncompetitive in the world market, or leave the price and compensate for customs payments by reducing its profits, which “cuts” the economy of the enterprise.

Some partners of Khabarovsk enterprises have already “switched” to New Zealand, Canada, USA. And with the next increase in duties in Russia, these countries will further increase their share in the Chinese market. However, we are in the first place in the export of sawn timber to China.

At some enterprises, workers have already received a warning about the suspension of activities. Other harvesters expect the government to change its decision or allow forest enterprises to supply their products for processing to those who already have processing plants and export the remaining roundwood at a quota of 6.5 %, as enterprises with processing facilities do. At the moment, there is no such mechanism.

Many logging companies have not engaged in processing not because they do not support the state’s policy to abandon the export of unprocessed timber, but because , from an economic point of view ,processing in these places is impossible. For example, in Yagodnoye, where the advanced Shelekhovsky Lespromkhoz is located, electricity is several times more expensive than in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, which is 100 kilometers from the village. In addition, small tenants do not have enough resources to build large production facilities. It is quite obvious that they expect that some large companies or an investor of the future pulp and paper mill will take the forest areas of the stopped enterprises? But who will give Chinese enterprises the forest before they build the PPM?

“As a scientist, I do not understand why some experiments are always invented for the forest complex of the Far East. And then to maintain the companies are switching to “manual control”, – the allocation of subsidies, quotas, says Natalia Antonova. – Moreover, a number of enterprises that have serious processing, have not received quotas for the export of roundwood at a reduced duty. Most often the reason was the occasional meager tax debt, say, a thousand rubles, which was revealed at the stage of obtaining documents. But the company lost their quotas for 2018″ .