At a meeting of the subcommittee “Investment policy and guarantee of the availability of financing” of the commission of the State Council of Russia in the direction “Industry”, a representative of the domestic manufacturer of electronics GS Group proposed to increase the import duties of Foreign LEDs up to 400% of the customs value of the products. The aim of this measure is to help Russian companies, which now find it difficult to compete with foreign manufacturers, to increase production and sales volumes.
The Moscow Department of Investment and Industrial Policy confirmed that the initiative had been discussed, but stressed that “the issue requires further study,” writes Kommersant.
Many market players agree with the proposal of the representatives of the GS Group. For example, the general director of the Association of Manufacturers of LEDs and systems based on them (APSS), Olga Grekova, supports the idea. It is true that she believes that it is not enough to impose exorbitant taxes on components: protection rights should also be imposed on already assembled LED devices.
At the same time, some experts warn that if such measures are taken, they will contribute to an increase in the volume of counterfeit products imported into the Russian Federation due to “gray schemes”. This position was expressed by the director of government relations of the manufacturer of LEDs “MSK BL Group” Evgeny Dolin.
In his opinion, it would be much more reasonable to reduce import duties on materials and components for production. But the representative of the GS Group is sure that this is not necessary, since “the quality of imported components is often lower than that of domestic components.”
The initiators of the project explained the need to increase the rights by the fact that domestic developers have to compete with manufacturers from the countries of Southeast Asia. Companies in this market segment offer low-quality products at the lowest possible prices, and national LED business activists would like to change this situation.
Author:
Ekaterina Alipova
Source: RB
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