Business news

MINSK, 23 May (BelTA) – Resident companies of the China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone and SZAO Industrial Park Development Company will be exempted from VAT if they buy products in Belarus for implementing their investment projects. The measures are stipulated by Belarus president decree No.166, BelTA learned from Kirill Koroteyev, First Deputy Director General of SZAO Industrial Park Development Company.

According to the source, the industrial park’s resident companies and the company in charge of developing the Great Stone industrial park will pay zero VAT on the products bought in Belarus for implementing their investment projects. Similar preferences are available in free economic zones in Kazakhstan.

The presidential decree also reaffirmed the right of the park’s subjects, first of all, investors to use other preferences, too. For instance, there are preferences meant to stimulate entrepreneurship in small and medium towns as well as rural areas.

According to Kirill Koroteyev, in line with the document the resident companies and the industrial park development company will be able to buy energy resources at lower prices. The measure is supposed to bring these prices as close as possible to the prices for fuel and energy resources in other countries of the Eurasian Economic Union. The price factor plays a large role as investors decide whether they want to start doing business in the China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone or not. According to the source, prices for natural gas and electricity will be set as low as the prime cost of natural gas and electricity. Natural gas and electricity distribution companies will not be able to make a profit on these sales.

The Great Stone resident companies will be able to enjoy the preferential profit tax rate as of the date profit is declared. Preferential rates of the real estate tax and the land tax will be in effect for the entire period the special taxation procedures are available. The same approach is used in free economic zones of Belarus, Russia, and Kazakhstan. The approach is most attractive for greenfield projects, stressed Kirill Koroteyev.

SZAO Industrial Park Development Company will be able to enjoy reduced rates of the real estate tax and the land tax for the entire period the special taxation procedures are available. The measure has been enacted in view of the similar regulations used in other Eurasian Economic Union countries. “Most of the real estate properties, which will be owned by the company — engineering and transportation infrastructure, public-use facilities — are not supposed to generate any profit,” summed up Kirill Koroteyev.