This year marks a cornerstone for both tax and customs legislation in Russia: Both the long-awaited new transfer-pricing rules came into effect, and WTO accession was finally made a reality. With the introduction of these new frameworks, taxpayers will be subject to an increased tax compliance burden, requiring a significant amount of additional documentation. On the other hand, a new set of defenses has also become available to taxpayers. This article explains how transfer-pricing documentation can help to support the value of goods at customs.
President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that the influence of the Collective Security Treaty Organization in regional affairs will increase and indicated that Russia would take a lead role in forming the organization’s new policies. “We share a common approach toward the questions of international and regional safety. I am sure that the role of the Collective Security Treaty Organization will increase,” Putin said during the opening remarks of the CSTO summit, a group of seven former Soviet states that was founded in 1992.
The long discussed proposal to make officials give up their much-loved luxury vehicles has received an official backing from president-elect Vladimir Putin. The billion-ruble sums of budget money currently spent on VIP-class vehicles would no longer be available for cars assembled outside of Russia and its strategic customs union partners – Belarus and Kazakhstan.
A working group of the Strategic Initiatives Agency has developed a road map to improve customs procedures in the country in an effort to improve the investment climate. The plan is in line with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's statement to the State Duma on April 11 that the government will take 100 steps to increase Russia's Doing Business rating by the World Bank. The stated goal is to move from 120th position to 20th place in the rating by 2020. The proposal, drafted jointly by businessmen, experts and officials, foresees a complete overhaul of the customs bureaucracy and its approach to dealing with imports and exports.
In December 2011, adjustments were made to several Russian federal laws, with the changes coming into force in the same month. Despite the fact that this law was supposed to be of a merely technical nature, bringing a range of laws into compliance with Customs Union terminology, it contains a number of substantial amendments that increase risks for companies involved in cross-border trade.
Average food import tariffs in Russia will drop from the current 10 percent to 7.8 percent as soon as Russia's entry into the World Trade Organization is complete, but challenges remain in taking advantage of the new status, industry experts agreed during the Food Business Summit in Moscow on Thursday.
Ukraine accused Russia on Monday of blocking Ukrainian cheese imports for political reasons in an escalation of a food-quality dispute. Russian consumer goods watchdog Rospotrebnadzor barred imports of cheese made by three Ukrainian producers last week after accusing them of using excessive quantities of palm oil, a cheap substitute for milk.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said Friday that Kiev is still considering joining the customs union between Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, Interfax reported.
State officials misspent more than 718 billion rubles ($22.7 billion) from the federal budget last year, the record amount in a decade, the Audit Chamber said. But only 7.5 billion rubles ($237 million), or 1 percent of the sum, "fall into the zone of corruption risks," the watchdog said in its report to the State Duma, cited by Izvestia on Thursday.
