MOSCOW: Russian consumer gas prices are expected to rise by 12 percent this year, not 15 percent as had been planned, as the government seeks to make Gazprom more efficient and curb inflation, the head of the Federal Tariff Service said on Thursday.
Sergei Novikov told reporters that the projected 15 percent increase this year would be revised down following a price decline on global markets.
Russia's domestic gas prices have already fallen by 3 percent since April 1.
The prices are calculated by a formula based on international oil product prices.
"There is a big chance this may happen in the third quarter as well," Novikov told reporters.
Annual inflation in Russia was running at 7.2 percent as of March 25, while the government targets 5-6 percent in 2013.
Gazprom has benefited from a steady increase in state-regulated domestic gas tariffs as the government has sought to achieve parity between the company's high export prices and its traditionally lower prices for domestic users.
Analysts said the state has been tweaking tariffs as a way to make Gazprom more efficient in order to help it maintain markets at home and abroad, although they criticise this approach so far as piecemeal and insufficient.
Gazprom's more important clients in Russia are power stations, which consume more than half of the gas it sells.
According to the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, Russia's gas consumption in 2013 will outstrip the pre-crisis level of 2008, while Gazprom is steadily losing market share.
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