Page 72 - RusRPTAug21

raising the property tax from a rate of 0.1% to 0.3% for houses, apartments, garages, and sheds. For properties whose value exceeds 300 million rubles ($4.4 million), the tax would be 2%. Other measures sent to the budget commission include an increased tax on alcoholic beverages and sugary drinks.
Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov warned of falling fossil fuel revenues as consumer demand shifts towards green energy. This year, 40% of Russian revenue is expected to come from oil and gas, with the Bank of Russia estimating that a proposed EU carbon tax could cost Russia as much as $9.7 billion annually. The Ministry of Finance is exploring tax and tariff measures to help Russia transition to the green economy, but in the meantime, it continues to invest in new oil and gas projects like Rosneft’s Vostok Oil Project in the Arctic.
This comes as the U.S. and Russia will hold high level talks on climate next week in Moscow. U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry will meet with Russian Special Representative for Relations with International Organizations Anatoly Chubais to discuss implementation of the Paris Agreement, nuclear and hydrogen energy’s role in a green energy future, and opportunities for cooperation on climate between Russia and the United States.
The government has worked out changes to the system of vertical administration over regional districts through the government and Kremlin’s appointed ‘curators.’ As of now, prime minister Mikhail Mishustin has 8 deputies who handle the larger regional blocs individually who shadow 8 tasked with the same from the Kremlin. There’s plenty of overlap going on too. From Mishustin’s side, Viktoria Abramchenko is handling Siberia, Yuri Borisov is handling the Urals, Tatiana Golikova is handling the Northwest, Dmitry Grigorenko is handling the Central district, Aleksandr Novak was handed the North Caucasus, Marat Khusnullin was given the South, Dmitry Chernyshenko took the Volga region, and Yuri Trutnev retained his long-time role handling the Far East. According to the new push, their main jobs are managing social development — handling local concerns, preventing income declines, warding off excessively wasteful budget spending, and intervening in local and regional fights over resources so they don’t have to come to Mishustin or Putin’s desk:
What’s rather hilarious is that three governors seem to have had anonymous sources leak to Vedomosti that they have no idea how the new system is actually supposed to affect decision-making or work in practice. It was announced at the Direct Line on June 30 without any prep, it seems. That the Kremlin has accepted a new “dual” system gives Mishustin a greater formal and informal role resolving regional matters and carries a clear logic as an extension of his Coordination Center — data collection, crisis management, and now social policy implementation will be vertically organized through his office. In other words, it’s now entirely on his team to keep the people happy or at least complacent enough while the Kremlin focuses all of its domestic energy on settling elite disputes or, in the case of tax reform, providing an avenue to protect the interests of big business or alternately browbeat them to action. That’s a long-term trend, but probably made far more palatable given Mishustin’s relative public popularity and lack of a clear, defined base of elite support outside of the regime’s technocratic cadres.
72 RUSSIA Country Report August 2021 www.intellinews.com