Customs Union Or Leather Shoes Tax Rate Of &Nbsp Will Increase Retail Prices.

Russian customs online website reports.

According to Natalia Jamie do Va, President of the Russian National Footwear Association, Belarus has asked the customs union committee to raise tariffs on leather shoes.

The request was signed by Alexander Guyanov, Vice Minister of foreign affairs of Belarus.

Since 2009, tariffs on imported leather shoes by Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan have been 10% of the value of imports of customs union members, but not less than 1 euro 8 euros per pair.

Now, Belarus proposes to impose a 20% tariff on importers, but not less than 2 to 7 euros per pair.

Belarus believes that raising tariffs will surely protect the manufacturers of leather shoes from Russia, Japan and Kazakhstan.

The import tariffs on leather shoes may increase after January 1, 2012, and before that, the customs union will suspend the tariff revision.

According to data from the Russian National Footwear Association, the size of the Russian footwear market in 2010 was 570 million pairs, of which 335 million 800 thousand were officially imported, 63 million 100 thousand were domestic shoes, and the rest were illegally imported products, accounting for about 30% of the total.

This shows that domestic shoes can only meet 10% of Russian demand.

The Russian shoemaking industry is developing slowly.

In the 7 years from 2003 to 2010, the output of leather shoes in Russia increased by only 13%.

Russia's national Footwear Association believes that higher tariffs will lead to an increase in covert imports in the case of existing capacity and output in Russia.

Even the present tariff is somewhat high. In addition to tariffs, importers still need to pay 18% VAT and about 1% customs formalities.

Businessmen say the new tariff itself will not increase the output of Russian shoes.

The shoes produced in Russia and Belarus are famous for their low quality. Therefore, the trade network prefers to import from China and Italy.

If the import tariff is raised to 20%, then the retail price of each pair of shoes will increase by 40% in Russian stores.