Petru Gutuleac, Marketing Director at the sugar enterprise Magt-Vest, has advised Moldovan border and customs authorities to toughen controls at the border owing to sugar smuggling from Ukraine.
In an interview with your Infotag correspondent, Gutuleac said the domestic market is flooded with contraband sugar; this is why, Moldovan producers can not sell products at their real price.
“In Ukraine, customs duties are much lower than in Moldova. In this condition, their [Ukrainian] producers allow sugar sale at lower prices. And we bear losses due to the inrush of contraband sugar”, the manager said.
The specialist said that though production costs went up, sugar producers can not sell sugar at its real price due to lower prices on contraband Ukrainian sugar.
“We will bear enormous losses if the government dies not intervene and does not stop the sugar smuggling from Ukraine urgently. We sell sugar at 10.5 lei/kg at the domestic market. Of course, consumers will buy cheaper sugar – at 9.5-9.8 lei/kg, and our products will remain in storehouses”, he said.
Infotag’s dossier: The Magt-Vest Company owns a sugar refinery in Glodeni. In 2011, it output about 30,000 tons of sugar.