BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
06/04/2011
Russia may cut off access to used cars from Belarus
Telegraf - The Russian government might decide to ban the import of foreign cars from Belarus till the end of June. "The flow of cars is coming, so Russia could block car access from Belarus, as it is a direct competitor of Russian car industry," said the director of Atlant-M Holpi company Alexander Skolubovich.
The company is the official representative of Mazda and Land Rover in the Republic of Belarus. The Russian automotive expert, Oleg Datsko, also believes that in case of a massive car flow from Belarus, Russian manufacturers will demand from the leadership of Russia to close the "Belarusian ventlight." For this purpose, for example, such vehicles may get under ban, BelTA informs.
If this happens, the used car market will collapse, because the Belarusians will have to sell cars in the country, says Director General of Belarusian Automobile Association (BAA) Ludmila Shabanova.
According to her, the used cars fever will start subsiding from July 1 after the rise of customs duties on foreign cars, imported into Belarus by physical persons. That is when the used cars sellers may start to have difficulty in selling them. "By the law of the market, if supply greatly exceeds demand, prices go down," said BAA General Director.
As she says, the car market was in a similar position a year ago when, waiting for the introduction of customs duties on foreign cars for individuals, people rapidly imported used cars from Europe to Belarus. "Some people even sold the apartment so that to buy used foreign cars," said Lyudmila Shabanova. The Russian Federation also let to its market only cars imported to Belarus prior to January 1, 2010 and only if they were corresponding to the standard not lower than Euro-4. As a result, prices for used cars in Belarus fell sharply from July 1; "autotrash" buyers incurred the greatest losses.
At the moment, the market of used cars is not experiencing difficulties; the prices of these cars have risen dramatically. Ludmila Shabanova has added that "black" car market, in contrast to the official automobile market, is pretty mobile, because it is not constrained by legal or some other restrictions. Thus, the majority of the spontaneous market sellers offer cars only for foreign currency, thus being able to buy and bring new cars in.
Director of Atlant-M Holpi, Alexander Skolubovich, in turn, has noted that vehicles, imported to Belarus after January 1, 2010, has already been brought in the Russian market. "The cunning entrepreneurs may have found a way to put them on record," he said.
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