Ukrainian Alcohol Exports under Fire
Head of the Federal Consumer Goods Supervisory Service (Rospotrebnadzor) Gennady Onishchenko has ordered a check of alcohol products imported from Ukraine. Analysts say that this is a move to stop the re-export through Ukraine of Moldovan wines banned in Russia. Concern has arisen on the market, however, that a ban on all Ukrainian alcohol products may result. Last week, Rospotrebnadzor stopped providing certification to all Ukrainian alcohol importers.
A statement by Rospotrebnadzor states that its territorial divisions have been instructed to monitor Ukrainian products for conformity to standards, “paying special attention to producers and suppliers that have not been active on the Russian market before.” The statement says that the monitoring will take into account the origins of the raw materials used in the products, the technological capacity of the producer and conformity to safety standards. The agency says that the check was planned in advance with regard to Onishchenko's March order “On Reinforcing Supervision of the Turnover of Alcohol Products.”
“Import of Ukrainian wines to Russia has doubled in the last half year,” notes executive director of the Union of Participants in the Alcohol Market Osman Paragulkov. “According to our data, that growth of import volume is inconsistent with the production capacity of Ukrainian vintners. That means re-export.” Rospotrebnadzor has not specified what types of Ukrainian alcohol will be subject to monitoring and declined to comment on the subject on Friday. The volume of hard liquor imports from Ukraine is much greater that that of wines.
According to alconews.ru, the industry Internet portal, 12.8 million liters of wine, excluding fruit wines and wine beverages, were imported into Russia in 2005 with a value of $8.7 million. Hard liquor imports exceeded 100 million liters and $674 million. Nemiroff, the second largest exporter of hard liquor to Russia, sends half of its production to this country, and accounts for 2.7 percent of the Russian market for vodka. About Ukrainian 40 companies export wine to Russia.
Echoes of the ban on Ukrainian meat products imports, which was subsequently extended to dairy products, are being detected in this latest move. Rospotrebnadzor has stopped issuing sanitary certification, which importers are required to obtain every 6-12 months when they renew import contracts. Practically all Ukrainian alcohol producers contacted by Kommersant on Friday reported problems with their deliveries to Russia. None of them were willing to comment for the record, however. The Rospotrebnadzor departments for Moscow and Moscow Region declined to state the reason for the stoppage of certification.
Svetlana Mentyukova; Alena Golubeva, Kiev
All the Article in Russian as of Oct. 16, 2006
|
