Page 153 - RusRPTApr23

closing European market to alternative markets in other countries - mainly to China and India.
Germany, the largest European buyer of Russian oil in the past, imported 21.6mn tonnes from Russia in 2022, which is 11.2% lower than in 2021, according to the statistical office Distatis. It must be assumed that the dynamics in the EU as a whole is approximately the same.
According to the IEA, the import of Russian oil to the United States has ceased since May 2022. Prior to that, in four months, the United States imported 7.4mn barrels of oil from Russia, or about 1mn tonnes. Thus, compared to 2021, Russian oil imports to the United States have decreased by almost 10 times.
Russia's exports of mineral fuel, oil and products of their distillation, bituminous substances increased by 42.8% in 2022 to $383.7bn, according to figures released by the Federal Customs Service on March 13.
Imports of oil and petroleum products gained 5.3% last year to almost $2.6bn.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said earlier that Russia’s crude exports totalled 242mn tons in 2022, up by 7.6%.
● Prices
Oil prices rise on March 1 and are at their highest levels in weeks thanks to optimism about fuel demand in China. The cost of May futures for Brent on the London ICE Futures exchange by was $83.95 per barrel.
According to the Russian Finance Ministry, the Urals price stood at $76.09 per barrel in 2022, $50.47 per barrel in December, $49.48 per barrel in January 2023 and the average price of Urals in February was $49.56 per barrel. Russia will not sell its oil at any price with the only goal of maintaining sales, First Deputy Energy Minister Pavel Sorokin said on March 1 during a conference of the Valdai discussion club.
Russia can shift to its own independent oil price benchmarks instead of the global ones already this year, the Energy Ministry said following a meeting of a committee of the parliament’s lower house State Duma attended by Minister Nikolai Shulginov on Wednesday. “The deputies asked the minister about the outlooks of creation of a local indicator that could mirror demand and supply for Russian oil blends (a Russian benchmark),” the ministry said.
153 RUSSIA Country Report Russia April 2023 www.intellinews.com