Tag: Latvia

  • Illegal Cigarette Factory Dismantled in Latvia

    Illegal Cigarette Factory Dismantled in Latvia

    Photo: Europol

    Latvian authorities dismantled a large illegal cigarette factory last week.

    The massive illegal manufacturing site was fully equipped with production machinery and raw materials. Police detained 32 people and seized nearly 300 million cigarettes, along with approximately 47 tons of leaf tobacco.

    If the cigarettes had entered the market, they would have deprived the Latvian state of more than €75 million in revenues, according to authorities.

    Searches were conducted simultaneously at multiple locations. Police carried out 26 searches in Riga, discovering warehouses containing cigarettes and detaining seven individuals, including six Latvian and one Russian national.

    Meanwhile, the state border guard carried conducted eight searches in Ludza, Rēzekne and Daugavpils, detaining 25 Ukrainian nationals at the Ludza factory, where counterfeit cigarettes were being manufactured under well-known brand names.

    The investigation was supported by Europol, which provided analytical support, and the Lithuanian Customs Criminal Service.

  • Latvia to Raise Liquid Tax by 21 Percent Yearly

    Latvia to Raise Liquid Tax by 21 Percent Yearly

    Photo: alexlmx

    Latvia will increase excise taxes on e-liquids by an average of 21 percent annually until 2026. The excise tax rates on heated-tobacco products and combustible cigarettes are set to increase by 5 percent and 5.6 percent every year, respectively.

    Meanwhile, the tax on other “tobacco substitute” products, including nicotine pouches, will rise by 10 percent.

    Tobacco harm reduction advocates warned that the measure would negatively impact Latvia’s efforts to curb smoking by making safer alternatives less attractive.

    “Increasing the taxation of safer nicotine products will discourage smokers from switching and push users back to smoking,” said Alberto Gomez Hernandez, community manager of the World Vapers’ Alliance, in a statement.

    “The international evidence has shown that increasing taxation of e-cigarettes and e-liquids has always led to an increase in smoking, particularly among young adults and low-income groups.

    “Latvia should follow the steps of countries that are successfully reducing smoking rates by encouraging smokers to switch, such as the United Kingdom and Sweden, instead of making it more costly for them.”

  • Latvian Vapers Petition to Retain Flavors

    Latvian Vapers Petition to Retain Flavors

    Photo: niyazz

    More than 10,000 citizens have signed a petition to keep e-cigarette flavors legal in Latvia, reports the Baltic News Network. Because the initiative has received the legally required number of signatures, it is entitled to a review by Latvia’s parliament, the Saeima.

    Rather than banning flavors, the petition urges Latvia’s government to crack down on illegal vape sales and educate society about healthy choices.

    According to the Tobacco-Free Products Association, the vaping industry targets smokers aiming to quit cigarettes, which are believed to be far more harmful than e-cigarettes.

    According to Toms Lusis, the author of the initiative, Latvian legislators’ attitudes toward vapor products are based on outdated beliefs and studies.

    “The latest scientific data shows that e-cigarettes are up to 95 percent less dangerous for human health than regular cigarettes,” he said. “The use of e-cigarettes [is] supported as a way out of sorts for residents to stop using tobacco products as well as radically combat the widely spread smoking-related diseases like lung cancer.”

    Lusis cautioned that by denying adults the freedom of choice when it comes to e-cigarette flavors, the state could also lose considerable revenue from excise tax on flavored e-cigarette liquids.

  • Illicit Cigarettes One-Fifth of Sales in Latvia

    Illicit Cigarettes One-Fifth of Sales in Latvia

    Photo: Makalu from Pixabay

    Illicit cigarettes accounted for 20.4 percent of the Latvian tobacco market in 2020, 3.6 percentage points more than in 2019, reports the Baltic News Network, citing Nielsen figures.

    The Latvian Chamber for Commerce and Industry (LTRK) notes that with this share, Latvia has come close to Lithuania where the percentage of illegal cigarettes was 21.8 percent last year. In Estonia, by contrast, the percentage of illegal cigarettes on the market was only 9.5 percent of the total market volume.

    LTRK Chairman Janis Endzins attributed the increase to the impact of Covid-19 on consumer purchasing power, a recently enacted ban on menthol cigarettes and Latvia’s excise tax policy.

    “At the end of 2020, we observed continued reduction of the illegal market, reaching its lowest point in the past 10 years. However, currently, there is no reason to expect positive changes,” he said. “Likely, this negative trend with illegal trade will remain in the future and will definitely affect alternatives to cigarettes, such as smokeless products, for which the government decided to rapidly increase excise tax in spite of experts’ recommendations.”

    According to Endzins, illegal online trade of e-cigarettes is on a rise, and there have been cases of contraband tobacco-heating devices being intercepted by the State Border Guard.

    Data from the study shows that 2.4 percent of all cigarettes consumed in Latvia last year were counterfeit. This means the total percentage of counterfeit cigarettes among all illegal cigarettes consumed in Latvia last year was nearly 12 percent. The largest portion of illegal cigarettes was carried to Latvia from Belarus (67.2 percent). Similarly to previously reported study periods, 61 percent of the total illegal cigarettes volume consisted of cigarette brands such as NZ, Premier, Queen, Minsk and Fest.

    Nielsen studies the illicit market every year by collecting empty cigarette packs and determining the origin of tobacco products based on excise labels and health warnings.  

  • Latvia sucks in illicits

    Latvia sucks in illicits

    Contraband products account for 25.2 percent of Latvia’s cigarette market, according to a story in The Baltic Course citing a report by Latvia’s main information agency, LETA, which, in turn, was based on a survey by AC Nielsen.

    Latvia is said to have the highest contraband-cigarette activity of the Baltic states. The share of contraband on Lithuania’s cigarette market, for instance, is reckoned to have been 19.8 percent during the third quarter of this year.

    Within Latvia, the highest share of contraband cigarettes, 52 percent, was recorded in Daugavpils, in the southeast of the country close to its borders with Belarus and Russia.

    In the Latvian capital Riga, the share of contraband cigarettes was 23 percent.

    The chairman of the Latvian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Janis Endzins, said that despite the efforts of law enforcement agencies, which seized millions of contraband cigarettes almost every day, Latvia still had the highest share of cigarette contraband among EU member states.

    And Endzins added that an ill-considered excise-tax policy was likely to boost contraband instead of bringing additional revenue to the state budget.

    Belarus is said to be the source of 66.5 percent of the contraband cigarettes entering Latvia, while Russia is in second place with 10.7 percent.

  • Iggesund expands services for Eastern Europe

    Iggesund Paperboard—Europe’s third-largest manufacturer of high-quality virgin fiber paperboard—is expanding its services for Eastern Europe by establishing a new freight terminal in Riga, Latvia, as well as a sales office in Moscow, Russia, to boost Russian sales. Construction of the two new facilities is part of Iggesund’s long-term plan to cultivate its delivery services on a global scale.

    “We need to be near the customer both in terms of deliveries and other services required by today’s customers,” says Rikard Papp, director Asia Pacific & Merchants Europe at Iggesund.

    Iggesund will also take part for the second time in the RosUpack exhibition, which will be held June 16-19 in Moscow.

    “The intense interest we met with last year convinced us that we should establish a sales office for the Russian market. It is a major market that definitely has room for a high-end product like [our flagship product] Invercote,” says Papp.

    Iggesund Paperboard’s terminal in Riga became operation in April, and the sales office in Moscow will be inaugurated in July.