The State Duma legalizes the northern delivery – Newspaper Kommersant No. 49 (7494) of 03/23/2023

The draft law “On Northern Delivery”, which provides for the creation of a centralized system for managing the supply of goods to hard-to-reach territories of the Russian Federation, was approved on Wednesday by the State Duma in the first reading. This basic document provides for the distribution of import authorities between levels of government, the definition of a single maritime transportation operator and the creation of a system for monitoring the movement of goods. The regions involved in the process were promised support with budget loans, including to contain prices for socially important goods imported from the north.

The State Duma on Wednesday in the first reading approved the basic bill “On Northern Delivery”. Now deliveries of products for hard-to-reach territories cover 25 Russian regions. We are talking about the annual 3.2 million tons of cargo with a total value of 87 billion rubles. However, this activity has not yet been regulated – as a result, as follows from the explanatory note to the project, it is “not effective enough” due to the risks of missed delivery dates and, accordingly, the need for manual control from the federal center. The problem was confirmed, in particular, by the failure of deliveries in 2021 to Magadan.

The essence of the bill is to build a centralized import management system. These are three-year supply planning, the appointment of the Ministry for the Development of the Russian Far East as the coordinator of the northern delivery, the determination by the government of a single maritime operator (it was supposed to be Rosatom). According to the project, the operator will ensure the transportation of goods between seaports. This provision caused concern among the Duma Committee on Competition – because of the risks of its restriction, it was proposed to establish requirements for the operator, select it on a competitive basis, provide for the possibility of carrying out transportation by alternative routes with the participation of other companies, and even, possibly, select several operators. The head of the Ministry for the Development of the Far East, Alexei Chekunkov, assured the Duma members that the presence of a single operator would not rule out supplies by other companies. He also reminded about the “jam” of icebreakers in December 2021 – the operator will be able to coordinate deliveries.

The bill also prescribes the distribution of powers for importation between levels of government. At the federal center, they are of a regulatory nature – this is, for example, the definition of state policy in this area and the approval of the list of the backbone transport and logistics network (objects necessary to build optimal logistics). The regions and municipalities have more applied tasks: organization, planning and implementation of delivery. To monitor the movement of goods, it is planned to create a state information system “Northern Delivery”.

All imported goods will be ranked: the first category will include goods necessary for life support (socially important, medicines, fuel – the regions will be able to set price limits for them), the second – goods for state needs, the third – all the rest. Cargoes of the first and second categories will have priority during transportation.

The Center is ready to provide the affected regions with preferential budget loans to replace commercial loans issued to companies for the purchase of life support goods. We are talking about loans at 0.1% per annum, the program is estimated at 55 billion rubles. in year. Among the expected effects of the innovations is a reduction in the delivery time of goods and a 15% reduction in the cost of northern delivery products (now prices, in particular, for food can be twice the national average).

Evgenia Kryuchkova