OREANDA-NEWS. On 09 July 2008 was announced, that in January-May of 2008, as preliminary data shows, Russia reduced oil export in comparison with the same period of 2007 by 5.3% which constituted 103.3 million tons. Ministry for Economic Development of the Russian Federation reported this estimation in the bulletin for January-May of 2008 which was published on Monday on the web site of the Ministry.

The slump in oil exports is connected with lowered down oil recovery and increased amount of domestic deliveries for refining, as the Ministry of Economic Development (MER) explains.

According to the information of the Ministry, in January-May of this year 87.7 million tons were exported to far-abroad countries (6.6% lowering down), including 79 million tons through the AK Transneft system (4% drop down).

15.5 million tons (2.6% above the level of January-May 2007) were delivered to the CIS countries in January-May of 2008. The increase in CIS deliveries is related to growth of export to Belorussia with decrease in deliveries to Ukraine and Kazakhstan.

According to the materials of the Ministry, the produced amount of oil containing condensed gas lowered down by 0.5% in January-May of 2008 against the corresponding period of the previous year and constituted 202 million tons.