Supplies of Russian oil to Belarusian refineries in the current year may reduce to 15.8 million tons. It was stated in Minsk by the Deputy Economy Minister of Belarus, Anatoly Filonov. "This indicated volume of oil was defined by the refineries, based on the needs of effective processing and the maximum yield of light oil", the Deputy Head of Ministry of Economy explained.
According to Anatoly Filonov, in recent years, Belarusian oil-refining plants processed about 20 million tons of oil a year.
Ministry representative noted that this volume takes full account of the planned volumes of duty-free oil — 6.3 million tons in 2010. «The refineries believe that it’s a way to work: make a mix, to buy additional amount of non-duty-free to duty free oil, what was done in the first quarter,» deputy minister said, Belarusian service of Radio Liberty reports.
Moreover, Anatoly Filonov stressed that «non-duty-free oil processing in full volume, taking in account the depth of processing at Belarusian refineries, is unreasonable from an economic point of view.»
«In conditions of mixed processing of non-duty-free and duty free oil in the first quarter, Mozyr oil refinery provided a positive profitability of oil processing», deputy economy ministry said. «Naftan finished the first quarter with a few losses — negative profitability was 0.5%».
According to Anatoly Filonov, it is planned that in four months Naftan faces break-even oil refining. In addition, the deputy minister noted that the logistics of Naftan, which supplies petroleum products for export through the Baltic ports, is more cost-based, comparing to the logistics of Mozyr refinery, mainly exporting oil through Ukraine and farther — to Europe.
Anatoly Filonov also informed that in early 2010, a positive balance for Belarus between imports of oil and oil products exports totaled 65 million dollars.
