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Apatit Awaits Help from Finance Ministry
The Fosagro Group, Russia's largest producer of phosphorus fertilizer, plans to build two plants to process nephelinic concentrate at a cost of $1 billion each. The Apatit Co., a member of the Fosagro Group, produces that concentrate as a waste product. It, however, is threatened with a complete shutdown because of the blockage of its financial accounts by the tax service. Fosagro is counting on Murmansk Region Governor Yury Evdokimov and Deputy Finance Minister Sergey Shatalov to intervene on its behalf. Fosagro chairman of the board Stanislav Pomytkin announced the plans yesterday to build the plants in Murmansk Region in Kirov, adjacent to Apatit, and in Leningrad Region in Pikalevo, near SUAL aluminum company's bauxite plant. The SUAL plant in Pikalevo was Fosagro's only nephelinic concentrate consumer until the end of last month, when it stopped purchasing it. The new plants will process 3.15 million metric tons of concentrate per year into 800,000 tons of bauxite, 6 million tons of cement, 536,000 tons of soda, 250,000 tons of potash and 30 tons of gallium. Construction of the first plant may be completed in three and a half to four years.
A major goal of the construction project is to solve Apatit's waste disposal problem. That company may be closed down soon though because of 5.3 billion rubles in tax claims and fines for 2001. Apatit general director Andrey Grigoryev said that the tax claims are unfounded and the blockage of its accounts threatens the payment of its workers and a technological catastrophe. The company has 147 hazardous facilities. Yesterday, Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov assigned Deputy Minister of Finances Sergey Shatalov to handle the situation. “The information from the Apatit management was presented objectively, but a court should decide the case,” Fradkov commented. A Fosagro source said that the intervention of Shatalov and Murmansk Governor Evdokimov should help settle the matter, after a regional arbitration court finishes hearing Apatit's suit to have the tax claims annulled. “Probably the sum of the compensation will be lowered and we will receive a extension on its payment,” the source said. “Some of the claims have already been successfully disputed in court.” The first hearing in the Apatit suit is scheduled for October 17.
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All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 12, 2005
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