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On July 15, during the extraordinary session the parliament debated in the first reading the draft law on Making Amendment and Addendum to the law on State Duty authored by the Government.

The key rapporteur, the Acting Minister of Economy Vahan Qerobyan has presented, it is proposed to set about 15% fixed expert licensed duty of the market prices at this moment towards the brand nomenclature classifiers of the copper, molybdenum concentrates and some external economic activity. It has been noted that the functioning system of the royalties does not sufficiently defend and ensure the equal distribution of the received incomes between the RA citizens and entities. The created super-favourable market conjuncture allows that the RA applies such duty, at the same time providing necessary new entries for the budget, and maintain rather favourable working environment for the entities.

Vahan Qerobyan informed that compared with the last year the prices of the copper and the molybdenum increased. Similar actions were applied not only in Armenia, but also in the RF and Chile.It is designed to review the system of royalties to correctly implement the protection of the lithosphere, to correctly distribute the incomes and to face the existing challenges.

The questions addressed to the rapporteur related to the copper price fluctuations, the profitability of the copper and the copper mines in the RA, mining, the lithosphere use concept and the strategy.

In his speech Sisak Gabrielyan noted that through many years the draft law had been awaited by the public. Though the parliament of the seventh convocation still functions, in the pre-electoral period the initiative is the first promise of the Civil Contract Party that is implemented. In the latter’s opinion, the RA lithosphere is nationalized which is every citizen’s property. Gabrielyan proposed his colleagues to vote for the draft law.