Over recent years, increasingly stringent rules have been introduced to reduce contamination of fuel used in maritime transport. These activities affect the global structure of trade in crude oil and can increase shipping costs.
Russia, the world’s biggest oil producer, has been gradually redirecting its oil exports from Europe to the increasingly more promising Chinese market, as China became the largest oil importer in the world.
The diversification of oil supplies triggers a higher growth of the prices in imports than the growth in its prices on the global markets, writes Poland’s central bank, NBP, in its report.
Russian authorities are turning their eyes towards the Russian Far East, seeing its development as an opportunity to balance the losses arising from the deterioration of political and economic relations with the West.