Russia to go ahead with timber duty increase

Russia’s outgoing president, Vladimir Putin, ordered an increase in duties to boost the domestic timber processing industry. The duties will rise to 25% from 20% on April 1 and the plan is to raise them to 80% next year. Russia, the largest economy outside the WTO and the world’s No. 2 oil exporter, has about one quarter of the world’s forests and wants to break its dependency on oil and gas revenues by promoting non-energy industries.

Experts said the increase would hurt processing firms in Finland and Sweden. Finland imports about 20% of its timber from Russia and higher duties will add to the costs of paper firms such as Stora Enso, the world’s biggest paper producer, UPM-Kymmene and M-Real. The rising duties will also complicate Russia’s WTO accession talks because EU diplomats say Russia will be in breach of a 2004 trade deal it signed with the European Union.

Russia has denied it is breaching the agreement, which will become public only after Russia’s accession. “I have seen the 2004 agreement and I can assure you that Russia’s actions violate this agreement,” an EU diplomatic source told Reuters. He said Russia had never offered the EU a comprehensive explanation for the rise in duties. The EU had previously said the April increase “would put an end to timber trade and make it impossible to find a solution in negotiation on timber duties”.

HOLD OUR GROUND

The Russians are keen to complete accession talks before their neighbor Ukraine, which has about five months to ratify its own WTO agreement. Russian officials say Ukraine’s entry could further complicate Russia’s own accession. “No one is breaching any agreements. This agreement will go into force only after Russia will become a WTO member. Everything Russia does before that does not contradict anything,” a Russian government source told Reuters. “We never promised anything. There were attempts... to agree on a ‘standstill principle’ and freeze the trading regime during the negotiations, we never regarded this principle as part of the negotiation process,” the source added.

Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, who leads the government’s WTO accession talks working group, met European Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson in Brussels this month and said talks on timber duties were “difficult but constructive”. Kudrin sees the WTO entry as Russia’s next major step towards integrating the country into the global economy after the liberalization of capital movement in 2006. Kudrin will travel this week to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two countries with which Russia has yet to conclude bilateral WTO deals, and will meet US counterparts in Washington during an International Monetary Fund conference. His schedule indicated he wanted to achieve a breakthrough in the talks before an expected government reshuffle in May after the inauguration of president-elect Dmitry Medvedev. His travel plans did not include further talks with EU trade officials, suggesting he lacked a mandate to offer concessions.

Another Russian government source close to negotiations said Russia would be prepared to back down if timber duties were the last hurdle. “There is an understanding that if the duties become the last unresolved question, Russia will then be ready to think about some concessions,” the source said. “But as long as there are other issues left, we will hold our ground.” (Reuters)