Romanian authorities have seized over 10 million smuggling cigarettes since the start of the state of emergency, reveal „StopContrabada.ro” statistics. The real time centralised system of tracking smuggled cigarette transports in Romania shows that smugglers are violating laws even during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to maintain huge profits.
Last year, the Romanian state lost around EUR 600 million due to cigarette smuggling, from unearned taxes and excise duties.
“Thus year, on the April 21, the National Day of Fight against Illicit Trade, (…) we cannot leave everything on the shoulders of those protecting us by exposing themselves to the danger on a daily basis. Amid the spread of coronavirus, it’s up to each of us to get assured that we are curtailing risks and we are buying only with tax receipt and only from stores, and not in the street. This way, we are protecting ourselves and we are helping the economy to recover more easily at the end of the crisis,” said Ileana Dumitru from the management team of British American Tobacco, Central and Southern Europe.