As previously reported by Logos Press, a month ago, the government withdrew the draft regulation that provided for the exemption of sugar imports (to the Moldovan market) from the free trade regime between CEFTA and CIS countries.
This decision was probably dictated by the fact that two business associations (producers of canned fruit and vegetable products and bakery products), as well as about half a dozen food industry enterprises from Moldova officially expressed their fears about the prospect of a commodity deficit and price increase for sugar if its imports, particularly from Serbia and Belarus, are completely blocked in the second half of this season.
At the beginning of May, at the initiative of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of RM, the Ministry of Economy held a discussion on the situation on the sugar market of the country, during which its operators – sugar producers and industrial consumers of this food component – presented their positions on the feasibility of sugar imports.
According to Victoria Graur, representative of the Association of Baking and Flour Milling Industry AIPM, the draft regulation on sugar imports, which is about to be finalized, envisages the introduction of an annual duty-free quota for the import of (Serbian) sugar, instead of unlimited sugar imports within the framework of the free trade agreement, particularly between Moldova and CEFTA.
According to unconfirmed information, its size is expected to be 6-7 thousand tons. Moreover, food industry operators in Moldova expect that the right to use a certain part (or even the whole) of this quota will be assigned to local industrial consumers of sugar. Besides, it is not excluded that the new draft regulations will provide for a possible quota for sugar import under the intergovernmental agreement between Moldova and Belarus.
Also, in order to increase the competitiveness of local food industry operators, in parallel with the regulation of sugar imports from CEFTA and CIS, the authorities are considering the possibility of increasing the quota for sugar supplies from the EU to Moldova – by 5 thousand tons. Moldovan food industry operators hope to get the government to reserve part of the euro quota for industrial sugar consumers.
“In such a variant it will be a balanced decision on preferential import of sugar to Moldova,” agree the representatives of the two mentioned food industry associations. – It will contribute to maintaining healthy competition on the Moldovan sugar market and, as a result, a competitive price for this commodity”.
