Amendments to the Tax Code envisage an excise duty of 25% of the customs cost of natural gas for non-resident participants in new gas PSA [production sharing agreements]. The law enters into force on 11 September 2009.

The State Tax Committee said that the new rules would grant foreign partners in existing PSAs a ten-year grace period on the excise tax payments, from the date the PSA was signed.

Three PSAs are in progress in Uzbekistan. Russia’s Lukoil has been developing the Kandym group of gas fields in the Bukhara region and exploring in the Ustyurt region under agreements worth more than US$2 billion since 2004. The company in 2008 started to develop fields in the Ustyurt and Southern Hissar regions under PSAs worth approximately US$700 million.

A consortium of Uzbekistan’s Uzbekneftegaz, Lukoil Overseas, Petronas, KNOC and CNPC is developing fields in the Uzbek sector of the Aral Sea under PSAs with an initial value of US$100 million.

Uzbekistan owns at least 50% of the three PSAs at the initial stage.

Malaysia’s Petronas plans this year to launch two PSA projects worth a total of US$1.1 billion in southern Uzbekistan.