OREANDA-NEWS. Belarus' plans to leave the VAT rate unchanged at 20% in 2014 and will struggle to restrain inflation growth within 11%, with GDP growth secured at 3.3%. These figures were mentioned during the session of the Presidium of the Cabinet of Ministers of Belarus, which discussed the draft social and economic development forecast, the budget plan, and monetary policy guidelines for next year.

Finance Minister Andrei Kharkovets announced that the tax rates will remain unchanged in 2014: the profit tax rate will stay at 18%, the value added tax at 20%. In his words, with an eye to reducing the tariff burden on manufacturing enterprises and improving the financial and economic position of energy and gas suppliers, the amount of duties payable by gas supplying organizations to the state budget was significantly reduced.

The finance minister accentuated the point that the key priority of the 2014 budget policy is to secure a zero-deficit budget. The previous edition of the budget plan suggested a budget deficit. Now they have made efforts to make a better balance by curtailing certain government expenditures in 2014.

The budget plan suggests that the government will put more effort in stimulating exports in 2014, Kharkovets said. Government subsidies will cover high-yield projects and interest rates for export credits.

The budget plan was developed on the optimistic assumption that the potash market will get back to normal along with potash export proceeds.

The inflation target for 2014 has been downgraded from 14.5% to 11%, as the government opts for a slow reform that suggests that private households shall pay the full cost of utility services, Economy Ministers Nikolai Snopkov informed. In his words, initially they had planned to make private households pay 50% of the full cost of utility services in 2014, but then the figure was reduced to 35-37%.