On October 3 and 4, Yuriy Trutnev, Minister of Natural Resources, visited OJSC “Surgutneftegas”. His visit was aimed at familiarizing with the Company’s production activities.

During his visit the minister took a helicopter tour over the Company’s fields, viewed production facilities where he watched a crew performing a side-tracking operation, and had a look at a coil tubing installation.

The minister then toured the Company’s R&D Institute “SurgutNIPIneft”, where he became acquainted with the process of continuous geologic imaging and various activities the Institute is involved in.

At a meeting with the Company’s management held afterwards Mr Trutnev reviewed the production figures of Surgutneftegas. Then the minister and the top managers discussed current issues associated with the mineral resources use, including revision of the Forest and Water Codes of the RF, and the Law “On Mineral Resources”; exploration work; hydrocarbon production and pipeline construction in the Republic of Sakha-Yakutia; problems companies face as they execute required documents to appropriate a piece of property to install production facilities or perform exploration work; and some other questions.

The minister rounded off the day at a regional press conference, where Mr Trutnev said the visit was interesting and instrumental and expressed a hope this visit would let the Company solve burning issues in the part of tax law.

Answering the journalists’ questions about difficulties caused by polishing the mineral resources legislation Mr Trutnev stressed that there should be transparent, readable, and clear requirements as obligatory as a law.

Then the minister voiced his hope for a fruitful cooperation with the managers and experts of the Company aiming at polishing the legislation and introducing graduated rates of mineral extraction tax depending upon the inherent geological advantages and disadvantages of various fields. Though, in the minister’s opinion, the transition should be evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

Making comments on the new version of the Law “On Mineral Resources” Mr Trutnev highlighted a number of amendments of great importance: the introduction of “cut through” licences, the revision of terms of licence agreements, amendments to the reserve classification standards, auction-based licence granting.

After the conference the minister flew to Khanty-Mansiysk, the capital of Yugra.

Press Service of OJSC “Surgutneftegas”