TLTP
\nMOSCOW
\nA third of the Russian budget is no longer dependent on oil and gas revenues, said President Vladimir Putin on Thursday, during his annual December press conference.
\n\u201cThis means that, while we\u2019re not completely there, we are nonetheless starting to get off the so-called oil and gas needle,\u201d Putin said. \u201cIf someone still wants to consider us as a gas station, then this has no real basis,\u201d he added.
\nAccording to Putin, the fall in Russia\u2019s gross domestic product (GDP) this year is 3.6 percent. \u201cThis is less than in all of Europe and the United States,\u201d he said. The Russian leader pointed out that the drop in GDP across most of the European countries was close to nine percent. At the same time, the Russian economy is doing better than the US.
\nMeanwhile, Russian coal suppliers could boost their exports to China, as the world\u2019s largest coal buyer is reportedly curbing shipments of the commodity from Australia amid escalating tensions between the two countries.
\nThe developer of the largest Russian coal deposit, Elga, announced on Tuesday that it created a joint venture with a Chinese shipping company to promote Russian coal on the massive Chinese market. The project between Elgaugol and GH-Shipping is set to satisfy China\u2019s growing demand for high-quality coking coal.
\nThe deal is set to help boost Russian coal supplies to China from one million tons this year to 30 million tons in 2023, and the developer could potentially further increase annual imports to 50 million tons.
\nThe joint venture is also expected to contribute to the ambitious goal of the Russian and Chinese governments to significantly increase bilateral trade turnover, as it would increase the volume of trade between the two countries by $5 billion per year.
\n\u201cThe supplies of coking coal from Elga will replace a significant amount of Australian and American coal of similar quality,\u201d Elgaugol Director-General Aleksandr Isaev said.
\nAnother Russian producer, Mechel, previously said that it was planning to increase exports of coal to China amid Beijing\u2019s restrictions on Australian imports. In November, the shipments rose by 13 percent, and are set to jump by 25-30 percent in December, Mechel CEO Oleg Korzhov said as cited by Russian media.
\nTensions between the two countries have been growing for around three years, after the Australian government began limiting Chinese investments in the country. In 2018, Canberra added fuel to the fire when it banned China\u2019s Huawei and ZTE from its 5G rollout. The most recent escalation occurred when Australia pushed in April for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus outbreak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
TLTP MOSCOW A third of the Russian budget is no longer dependent on oil and gas revenues, said President Vladimir Putin on Thursday, during his annual December press conference. \u201cThis means that, while we\u2019re not completely there, we are nonetheless starting to get off the so-called oil and gas needle,\u201d Putin said. \u201cIf someone still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":51669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business"],"yoast_head":"\n