The tax will be payable by businesses with a comprehensive environmental permit or environmental permit, including, but not limited to, energy industry facilities.
The authorities call the document “a project of high complexity”. It is now at the stage of development and preliminary public consultations.
“We are introducing new taxes, such as a carbon tax, which we are discussing with our colleagues in the government, especially the Ministry of Energy, given the possible impact on tariffs. We are being very careful to ensure a correct and pragmatic approach,” Grigore Stratulat, State Secretary of the Environment Ministry, specified at a meeting of the Parliamentary Commission for European Integration.
Besides the introduction of new taxes, it is planned to revise the mechanism of income redistribution between the state and local budgets.
“We propose new approaches to the calculation of these taxes and the inclusion of all environmental payments in the National Environmental Fund, from which environmental projects will be financed,” the state secretary added.
The document is linked to a number of other legislative initiatives in the field of climate policy and waste management. It is planned to update the landfill tax, the extended producer responsibility tax and the introduction of a tax on single-use plastics.
The current law on pollution charges from 1998 will be repealed.
The authors note that the draft law is not a direct transposition of European directives and regulations, but it is included in the reform agenda and the Economic Growth Plan of the Republic of Moldova, so it will be additionally coordinated with the European Commission.
At the end of April, the document is planned to be sent for consideration at a meeting of the government’s secretaries-general. The adoption of the law is expected before the end of the year.
