Over the past 30 days, the local authorities have managed to seize over 40 million of smuggled cigarettes to reach the black market in Romania, a press release informs.
The value of the catches amounts to RON 20 million and represents about 30 percent of all cigarettes captured since the beginning of the year, according to the data available on the www.stopcontrabanda.ro, a British American Tobacco (BAT) campaign.
Over 14 million counterfeit cigarettes, the biggest catch this year, were discovered by the customs officers in Constanta in a container from Turkey, 4 million smuggling cigarettes were found in the two storage spaces in Vrancea and another 6 million unstamped cigarettes were found in Arad, according to BAT data.
According to the quoted source, an increase of one percentage point in smuggling means about EUR 40 million not collected by the state as taxes and excise duties.