Recent legal & business developments in Belarus, February 2009
1. On February 12, 2009 the President of the Republic of Belarus adopted the Edict “On certain issues of the activity in the sphere of forestry”. By virtue of this Edict the institute of “special exporters” was terminated. Previously only a limited number of companies (RUE “Bellesexport”, RUE “Belarustorg”, RUE “Bellesbumpromexport”), so called “special exporters” were authorized to sell for export certain types of timber industry products. Other companies had to enter with the said companies into commission or agency agreement in order to sell their products for export.
2. By virtue of the Decree of the President of the Republic of Belarus No. 104 dated 19 February 2009 certain changes will be brought to the state regulation of foreign trade activity. The said Decree simplifies the control over and execution of foreign-trade operations, inter alia, the mechanism of the drawing up of the transaction passports is substituted by the registration of transaction, it is permitted to close the obligation under the contract in non-cash form, etc. The Decree will come into force from April 1, 2009.
3. On February 23, 2009 during the visit of Polish governmental delegation to Minsk, the Memorandum on the cooperation in the development of financial markets was concluded between OJSC “Belarusian currency and stock exchange” and Warsaw stock exchange. According to the Memorandum, the main areas of cooperation shall be the interaction in the elaboration of perspective development and enhancement of the infrastructure of financial markets, as well as informative and technological cooperation.
4. On February 6, 2009 the President of the Republic of Belarus approved the Edict No. 70, pursuant to which the procedure of the registration of prices on new goods and services is simplified, the list of the products, the prices on which are regulated by the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus is shortened. Moreover for year 2009 the Council of Ministers does not stipulate the maximum indexes of the changes of prices.
5. From February 1, 2009 the notifying principle of the state registration of all forms of businesses came into force. The registration will be carried out on the same day when the necessary documents are provided. The list of documents necessary for registration is minimal. For the registration of legal entity only the charter and the document, confirming the payment of the state duty, are required. It is not allowed to refuse in the state registration if all necessary documents are submitted.
6. During the meeting of the Integration committee of EurAsEc and Commission of Customs Union, it was decided that the common customs tariff of Belarus, Russia and Kazakhstan should be prepared before April 1, 2009. During the meeting the draft Agreement on the exchange of the confidential information between the bodies authorized to control the equity market for the purpose of the protection of the rights of investors was examined.
7. During the visit of the minister of economy of Poland in Minsk, the Deputy Prime-Minister of the Republic of Belarus Andrei Kobakov proposed Poland to participate in the privatization of Belarusian companies in 2009-2010.
