Flowers in Russia can traditionally rise in price before March 8, but the situation on the border with Belarus risks becoming another reason, the Business FM radio station predicts. According to representatives of the flower business, trucks with flowers are being held up at customs.
So, the founder of the “Flower row” network Ivan Utenkov said that cars are not given to the owners after passing the inspection. “A similar practice has been observed in our country since February 4. If this situation continues further, on March 8 the flowers will be golden. And instead of spending from 700 to 1000 rubles, the men of the Russian Federation will have to spend 1500, or even 2000 rubles,” he fears.
To store flowers, a certain temperature is needed, and if the refrigerated trucks run out of fuel, the cargo will deteriorate, and this is fraught with shortages and higher prices. “We generally expect that the flower will be record-high. If the standard price tag went up by about 10-15 percent, then I think that this year it may rise by 50 percent,” said the director of a large flower shop Obradoval.ru “Georgy Sukharzhevsky. Customs officials, in turn, said that they are conducting an inspection, which is related to the suppression of gray schemes for the supply of flowers to Russia.
Belarus became the main supplier of flowers to Russia in 2018, it accounts for 49.5 percent of production, in most cases this is re-export from other countries, mainly from the Netherlands. In Belarus, there is no VAT on the import of flowers, and it is profitable to supply them to Russia through the republic.
On Monday, February 22, Sochi will host a meeting between the presidents of Russia and Belarus, Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko. It is planned that they will discuss a joint response to emerging challenges, including military ones, as well as touch upon key issues in the development of relations between Belarus and Russia, large joint projects and integration processes within the Union State.