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Lithuanian government approves of tax raise for amber extraction

BC, Vilnius, 20.08.2015.Print version
The Lithuanian Government has approved the initiative of the Environment Ministry to raise the tax for amber extraction. A 44-fold tax increase for a kilogramme of pieces of amber greater than 40 millimetres has been proposed, reports LETA/ELTA.

Amber Bay in Juodkrante.

Environment Minister Daiva Matoniene says that valuable minerals in European Union member states are subject to a tax of at least 15% of their value. Meanwhile, in Lithuania the tax rate was established in 1992 and amounts to 5% of the value of amber. If Parliament supports the new tax rates, they would enter into force from 1 January 2016.

 

As reported, the Law on Taxes on State Natural Resources stipulates that every kilogramme of extracted amber is taxed by EUR 20.22. The Ministry of Environment has proposed to increase the tax to EUR 280 per kilogramme if pieces of amber are smaller than 40 millimetres, and to apply EUR 900 tax rate when they are larger than 40 millimetres.

 

Based on preliminary estimates, there are approximately 112 tonnes of amber in Juodkrante deposit. If the newly proposed taxes are applied, 20 years of exploitation of the deposit would bring EUR 41 million in revenue. 70% of the amount would be transferred to the state budget, 20% would be left to the local municipality and 10% would go to the Environmental Protection Support Programme.

 

After the geopolitical situation shifted, Lithuanian businesspeople are no longer issued licences to import raw amber from Russia's Kaliningrad Region, which is a source of 95% of the world's known amber resources.






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