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Latvian Saeima passed in the final reading amendments to the law on excise tax today, stipulating that from now on stricter limits will apply to the amount of tobacco products that private individuals from third countries can bring with them to Latvia; furthermore, persons will not be able to bring the allowed amount of tobacco products across the border of Latvia more often than one time per day.
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The Grodno Tobacco Factory Neman has installed a new production packaging line. The new equipment will produce 1.75 billion King Size format cigarettes a year, BelTA learnt from Belgospischeprom Concern.
The cost of the equipment made up €5.63 million. At present, the company is assembling the new packaging line. The equipment is expected to be put into operation in late May this year.
This big investment project was included in the state import-substituting programme for 2009. In February this year, the equipment to produce and pack cigarettes (PROTOS 2C type) was supplied to the Grodno Tobacco Factory Neman from Germany’s Hauni Maschinenbau AG. At present, the new equipment is being installed.
The launching of the new production packaging line together with the super slims cigarettes production line launched in December 2008 will allow Neman to produce all kinds of the cigarettes which are imported to Belarus.
The Belarusian Ministry of Trade has suggested abolishing an import quota on cigarettes on January 1, 2008.
The ministry has already drawn up a draft directive providing for the measure and submitted it to the Council of Ministers, the ministry's official told BelaPAN.
The measure is part of agreements between Belarus and Russia on removing barriers in mutual trade.
President Alexander Lukashenko has ordered the Belarusian government to normalize the situation in the country’s tobacco market by January next year.
“All the shortcomings in the functioning of the tobacco market have to be removed. The aim is to produce high-quality and competitive products,” Lukashenko said after a meeting on the problems of the Belarusian tobacco market on Thursday.
Lukashenko also said it was inadmissible to lobby interests in this sphere. Tobacco products are a highly profitable business, which should be a source of budget revenues.
Conclusions. Smoking rates among men in these countries have been high for some time and remain among the highest in the world. Smoking rates among women have increased from previous years and appear to reflect transnational tobacco company activity.
In Russia BAT has three factories and it is one of the three most powerful companies in the industry with very strong brands, such as Kent, Vogue, Pall Mall, and Yava Gold. In Ukraine we have one factory, and in 2002 we became market volume leader. Our brand Priluki Osoblivy is currently the best-selling brand in Ukraine.
BAT has invested more than US$ 300 million in Uzbekistan and enjoys the dominant market share there. Comparing Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and Uzbekistan on the basis of business conditions for international companies we can say that the most favourable market situation is in Russia. Market reforms are well advanced there and existing conditions stimulate the development of business activity, including tobacco companies. In Ukraine the state is attempting to control the market by means of tax policy and regulations which sometimes contradict previously issued laws. In the mid nineties the Ukrainian government increased excise rates, which provoked an increase in illegal imports of cigarettes.
This, in turn, led to multi-million dollar losses for the state budget as sales of local manufacturers fell sharply. In Belarus and Uzbekistan business environments are similar, as both economies are experiencing a significant degree of interference by state authorities.
"A joint project to form a single economic space within the framework of the Treaty for the Establishment of a Union State will contribute to further expansion of trade and economic ties between our countries," Russian Vice- Premier Viktor Khristenko wrote in a letter to Belarussian Prime Minister Gennady Novitsky, Tass reported.
A copy of Khristenko's letter to Novitsky was received by Itar-Tass on Wednesday, the agency reported.
A Russian government source elaborated that Belarus unilaterally imposed restrictions on several Russian export items, including beer and tobacco products, in contradiction of the letter and spirit of Belorussian-Russian bilateral agreements, the agency reported.
In the second quarter of the current year the Grodno tobacco factory ?Neman? will launch the production of lights and super lights cigarettes of the popular brands ?Minsk?, ?GTF?, ?Premier? and ?Magnat?. This is going to be absolutely new products as the factory has installed new equipment after the reconstruction, deputy director of the enterprise Mikhail Iosko told reporters on January17.
According to Mikhail Iosko, the new technological equipment will let the enterprise annually produce 14,5 billon cigarettes. It is three times more than the joint venture ?Tabak-invest? produces now.
Alexander Lukashenko issued decree On state regulation of production, turnover, advertisement and consumption of tobacco, Interfax-West was told in the presidential press-service. The decree, in particular, states that tobacco goods are to be produced by legal bodies alone - commercial organizations and non-commercial ones, which are part of the Belarusian Union of consumers.
Belarus announced a ban on smoking at all medical establishments in the country Thursday, according to reports reaching here from Minsk.
The ban was imposed by orders from Public Health Minister Igor Zelenkevich and came into effect on the same day, a spokesman for the Belarussian Public Health Ministry was quoted as saying. . .
A recent survey indicates that nearly 50 percent of the country 's population smoke. "Belarus is now living through a veritable epidemic of tobacco smoking, which is very dangerous for people's lives," said Deputy Public Health Minister Valery Filonov.
Filonov noted that the drive against smoking in Belarus is especially urgent because the republic had suffered from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, and each cigarette for a man is "another small Chernobyl."