Subsoil - part of the earth's crust, which is located under the soil layer. If there is none, then the location of the subsoil is below the surface of the earth, and also below the watercourses and the bottom of water bodies, which extend to the depths available for development and geological exploration.
The current Subsoil Law controls relations that arise as a result of geological exploration, protection and use of subsoil in the Russian Federation, its shelf, and also as a result of the use of mining waste and related processing industries (sapropels, peat and other resources, including brine estuaries and lakes as well as groundwater).
The current law contains the economic and legal basis for the protection of mineral resources and their complex rational use. This Subsoil Law provides both protection for citizens of the Russian Federation and the state itself, including the rights of subsoil users. The effect of this law is widespread throughout the Russian Federation, as well as on its continental shelf.
The Subsoil Law of the Russian Federation is based on the Constitution and consists both of the current law with other federal laws adopted in accordance with it, and of other regulatory acts, as well as of laws and other legal acts of the subjects of our country.
Subsoil ownership
The state’s property is not only the areas located on the territory of the Russian Federation and the corresponding underground space, but also energy and other resources located in the bowels of the earth, as well as minerals. The possession, disposal and use of subsoil is carried out jointly by the Russian Federation and its constituent entities.
The Subsoil Law stipulates that subsoil plots cannot be sold, bought, donated or inherited, or invested or disposed of in any other way. Subsoil use rights may be transferred from one entity to another or alienated solely in cases that the Federal Subsoil Law may allow.
Minerals and other resources that were extracted from the subsoil, under the terms of licensing, can be owned by subjects of the Russian Federation, as well as in private, municipal, federal state ownership, as well as in other possible forms of ownership.
Why do you need a reserve fund
The reserve plots fund is being formed in order to meet the future needs of the Russian Federation for both strategic and scarce types of minerals from those subsoil plots that have not yet been leased. The Subsoil Law does not allow the use of those areas that are part of the reserve fund until a decision is made to exclude them from the reserve fund.
Decisions on the inclusion or exclusion of subsoil plots from the federal fund are made by the Government of the Russian Federation on the proposal of the executive authority, unless otherwise provided by federal law.
State supervision for the study, protection and rational use of mineral resources
The main objective of state supervision is the prevention, detection and suppression of violations of subsoil users, as required by international treaties of the Russian Federation and the legislation of the Russian Federation on subsoil, as well as the rules, norms and standards approved by the law of the Russian Federation in the field of geological exploration, protection and rational use of subsoil.
State supervision is carried out by the executive branch, or rather, the authorized federal body, such as federal state supervision, as well as regional state supervision according to their competence in the manner established by the supreme executive body of the subject of state power of our country and its Government.