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Economy Ministry: No reason to revise Belarus' GDP forecast for 2019

Monday, 13 May 2019

The Belarusian Economy Ministry sees no reason to revise the country's GDP forecast (planned at 4%) as well as other macroeconomic parameters for 2019, Economy Minister Dmitry Krutoi said in an interview to the Belarus 1 TV channel, BelTA has learned.

Dmitry Krutoi believes that “there are no reasons to revise the forecast until the H1 results are known”. The situation in the agricultural sector, for example, should be taken into account. Experts are forecasting the possible yields and forage stocks. The minister also mentioned an accident with the polluted oil. In his words, experts are currently assessing the impact of the poor-quality oil in the Druzhba pipeline on transit, i.e. on the sales and the oil refineries themselves.

Speaking about the possible consequences of the tax maneuver in the Russian oil industry on the Belarusian economy, Dmitry Krutoi said that no compensation on the tax maneuver had been envisaged in the 2019 forecast. The country will follow the same policy in 2020. “The talks with the Russian counterparts are in full swing. As of today, without the final decisions on the oil sector and gas prices, we are proceeding from the worst-case scenarios. Under the current conditions we see no reason to abandon the parameters set for the social and economic development program. If we are able to agree with our Russian counterparts, this will be an additional benefit for our macroeconomic assessment,” the minister said.

Speaking about the tax maneuver, Dmitry Krutoi added that the expected compensation for the losses of the Belarusian economy in 2019 and 2020 is insignificant if compared to the GDP, budget, export volumes and other key macroeconomic parameters.