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Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
Time: 8:38 pm
Time: 8:38 pm
Results for illicit cigarettes
3 results foundAuthor: de Lacy, Elen Title: Predictors of tobacco smuggling in the South Wales Valleys Summary: In the space of one week in November 2008, Welsh Trading Standards officers in twelve South East Wales authorities conducted authenticity checks on over 54,000 packs of cigarettes and hand rolling tobacco. As a result of this work, over 45,000 cigarettes and 144kg of hand rolling tobacco were seized. There are different types of illicit trade in tobacco products. These include large scale smuggling, bootlegging and counterfeit smuggling. Not all smuggling involves counterfeit products. Smuggled products may also be UK manufactured tobacco products that have been diverted to the black market. Definitions - Smuggling is the illegal transport and distribution of tobacco products, usually without payment of correct government taxes. Smuggling can be large scale or small bootlegging operations. - Counterfeiting is the illegal production of "fake" brand cigarettes without the consent of the brand owner. Cheap and illicit tobacco undermines price (tax) and other tobacco control measures such as age of sale regulations. The criminal activities of smuggling, and increasingly, counterfeiting, lead to the availability of tobacco at less than half the tax-paid price in many deprived areas. This maintains smokers in their addiction and encourages young people to start smoking. It is estimated that 11.6% of all internationally traded cigarettes are smuggled, equivalent to 657 billion cigarettes a year, causing losses to government revenue worldwide of US$40.5 billion. In the UK by the late 1990s, cigarette smuggling had reached epidemic proportions. The tobacco industry estimated that 25%-30% of the total market was made up of illegally imported cigarettes15 although Customs & Excise estimated the figure to be no more than 21%16. Tobacco smuggling was costing the Government more than L3 billion a year in lost revenue. Cutting tobacco tax cannot solve the problem of smuggling. Even if all countries levelled exactly the same level of taxes and had identical prices, smuggling would still continue at a large scale. The total illicit cigarette market in high income countries is 9.8% compared to 16.8% in low income countries. It has been estimated that if the global illicit trade were eliminated, governments would gain at least $31 billion, and from 2030 onwards would save over 160,000 lives a year. Details: Cardiff: ASH Wales, 2011. 17p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 25, 2014 at: http://www.ashwales.org.uk/creo_files/upload/default/report_of_predictors_of_smuggling_in_the_south_wales_valleys.pdf Year: 2011 Country: United Kingdom URL: http://www.ashwales.org.uk/creo_files/upload/default/report_of_predictors_of_smuggling_in_the_south_wales_valleys.pdf Shelf Number: 134237 Keywords: Cigarette Smuggling (U.K.)Illicit CigarettesTax EvasionTobacco Smuggling |
Author: Economist Intelligence Unit Title: The Global Illicit Trade Environment Index. Overall Results Summary: Behind most every major headline, every major story in the news, lies another potential headline and another story about some form of illicit trade. From the refugee crises in the Mediterranean and South-east Asia, where the chaos is providing cover for human traffckers, to North Korea, a criminal state that couldn't survive if it didn't trade in arms, illicit cigarettes and counterfeit currency. Even the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election has led to indictments on money laundering, which is both a product of illicit trade and a facilitator of it. To measure how nations are addressing these and other issues related to illicit trade, the Transnational Alliance to Combat Illicit Trade (TRACIT) has commissioned the Economist Intelligence Unit to produce the Global Illicit Trade Environment Index. The global index expands upon an Asia-specifc version, originally created by The Economist Intelligence Unit in 2016 to score 17 economies in Asia on the extent to which they enabled or prevented illicit trade. This year's updated and expanded version now includes 84 economies, providing a global perspective and new insights on the trade's societal and economic impacts. Key fndings from the index are: - With a score of 85.6 (out of 100), Finland ranks frst in the overall index, besting the United Kingdom by only 0.5 points. The rest of the top 10 is rounded out by a handful of European countries (Sweden, Austria, Netherlands, Denmark and Germany), along with the United States, Australia and New Zealand. - At the bottom of the overall index is a group of developing economies from all regions of the globe. Libya ranks 84th out of 84 economies, with a score of 8.6, and is joined by Iraq in 83rd place, scoring less than six points better. Faring slightly better, but still poorly, are a group of economies that score in the twenties and thirties in the index: Myanmar (82nd), Laos (81st), Venezuela (80th), Cambodia (79th), Kyrgyzstan (78th), Belize (77th), and Ukraine (76th) and Trinidad and Tobago (75th). - Regionally, Europe (34 economies in the index), which includes the EU-28 plus six other countries, earns the highest the average score (68.0). The Asia-Pacifc (21 economies) comes second at 56.0 and the Americas (19 economies), including the US and Canada, is in third at 54.0. The Middle East and Africa (10 economies) is last among the regions, mainly due to low scores on the "supply and demand" and the "transparency and trade" indicators. - Among the four categories in the index, the highest average score (69.0) across all 84 economies is in "customs environment," which measures how effectively an economy's customs service manages its dual mandate to facilitate licit trade while also preventing illicit trade. - The lowest average score (50.0) is in the "supply and demand" category, which measures the domestic environment that encourages or discourages the supply of and demand for illicit goods. A close look at the global environment that enables illicit trade can prove a somewhat dispiriting exercise. The average overall score in the Global Illicit Trade Environment is a shade under 60.0. Where economies aren't underresourced in customs or law enforcement, they may otherwise be indifferent or actively neglect illicit practices in order to continue reaping the economic benefits of being a global financial centre (like the UK) or a regional logistics hub (like Singapore, Dubai and Panama) or one of the world's factories (like China and Vietnam) or a main source of narcotics (like Colombia). Or they may just be corrupt; corruption is far more pervasive than people appreciate and it is by no means limited to the developing world, as investigations in the US and elsewhere have recently shown. As we noted in our 2016 paper, however, and emphasise again in this year's edition, there is an international community of people- observers, experts, private sector executives and government offcial- who have identified the many ways in which illicit trade, in all it various forms, can be combatted. The solutions they propose range from the quotidian to the more extreme. Few, if any, are unrealistic. What the index, this paper and all the other papers published alongside it as part of the larger project, proposes is that economies that are laggards on the issue can start small and build towards a better environment for preventing illicit trade. And the economies that are leaders should lead. Details: London: Author, 2018. 44p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 24, 2019 at: https://www.tracit.org/uploads/1/0/2/2/102238034/eiu_global_illicit_trade_whitepaper_final.pdf Year: 2018 Country: International URL: https://www.tracit.org/uploads/1/0/2/2/102238034/eiu_global_illicit_trade_whitepaper_final.pdf Shelf Number: 156605 Keywords: Economic CrimesIllicit CigarettesIllicit ProductsIllicit TradeMoney Laundering |
Author: KPMG Title: Eurasian Economic Union Illicit Cigarette Report Summary: Key findings: Illicit cigarette consumption has grown rapidly in the Eurasian Economic Union from 2015 to 2018 - Illicit cigarette consumption rose from 0.6% to 6.8% of total consumption in the past 4 years, representing over 20bn cigarettes in 2018 - Had these cigarettes been sold legally in 2018, an additional 68bn RUB would have been collected in taxes (VAT & Excise) across the Eurasian Economic Union in 2018, with 99% of the taxes lost from Russia - A large proportion of the growth occurred in the Russian Federation, where non-domestic cigarette consumption increased from 0.7% to 8.7% of consumption, of which 90% was illicit. Widening price differences between countries and free movement of goods and people are two possible drivers behind the growth in illicit cigarette consumption - The price differences (in particular between Belarus and Russia) have increased by over 40%, making cigarettes from Belarus more affordable(с) - In addition, the establishment of the EEU (in 2015) enabled free movement of goods and people, reducing customs inspections between countries and removing limits on goods imported for personal consumption - The 8 billion Belarusian labelled cigarettes identified in Russia were not supported by the number of travellers buying for their own personal consumption, indicating that a high volume of cigarettes are contraband. Furthermore the seizures of millions of Belarusian labelled cigarettes in Russia indicated that these cigarettes are transported by criminal networks. Distributors of illicit cigarettes have grown to exploit the price differences, reduced affordability and the lack of personal allowance quotas when travelling between EEU countries, especially from Belarus to Russia - Belarus is the primary source of illicit cigarettes, with almost 8 billion of the 20 billion illicit cigarettes identified in this study coming from Belarusian trademark-owned manufacturers, whilst production capacity was reported at 29 billion cigarettes(4) which is not supported by domestic consumption (estimated at 16 billion) - Belarusian labelled cigarettes were identified across Russia, indicating that they are being purchased by consumers who are not travelling across the Belarusian border - In addition, 47% of C&C identified had no identifiable origin including counterfeit, illicit whites and cigarettes with suspicious Russian tax stamps, which have had no taxes paid in any jurisdiction. Some may be illegally manufactured inside Russia - Illicit cigarette smuggling has been shown to help enable Organised Criminal Groups (OCGs), using similar networks to sell other products and its rapid growth in EEU is unlikely to be any different, as profits can be high whilst penalties remain low. Throughout the report, our analysis has focussed on the following categories of cigarette consumption: Legal domestic consumption - Cigarettes legally purchased and consumed within the country of study, based on In Market Sales data provided by the tobacco industry Non-domestic legal (ND(L)) - ND(L) represents cigarettes which are purchased in another country but legally consumed in the country of study, through cross-border or tourism purchases. This represents 0.8% of total consumption in the EEU Illicit consumption - divided into three components: - Illicit Whites: Cigarettes that are usually manufactured in one country/market but which the evidence suggests have been smuggled across borders during their transit to the destination market under review where they have limited or no legal distribution and are sold without payment of tax - Contraband (Other): Cigarettes where the tax was paid legally in one country, but the cigarettes were taken to another country and re-sold without any applicable tax, mainly when the excise tax regimes in the source country are lower than the destination country. Many of these cigarettes originated from an EEU country and whilst they were legally transported (due to no legal personal allowance limits) they were then re-sold illegally - Counterfeit: Cigarettes that deliberately copy a legally traded brand, deceiving consumers who believe that they are purchasing this brand. Counterfeit was only identified by participating trademark owners in the Empty Pack Survey - Russian suspicious tax stamps: Cigarettes where further analysis has revealed that the packs may have been sold without the payment of tax, despite bearing domestic labelling Details: London: Author, 2019. 48p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 28, 2019 at: https://www.stopillegal.com/docs/default-source/external-docs/eea-illicit-cigarette-report-2018-english.pdf?Status=Temp&sfvrsn=ab4677d7_2 Year: 2019 Country: Europe URL: https://www.stopillegal.com/docs/default-source/external-docs/eea-illicit-cigarette-report-2018-english.pdf?Status=Temp&sfvrsn=ab4677d7_2 Shelf Number: 156923 Keywords: AsiaCigarettes ContrabandCounterfeit Cigarettes Counterfeit Goods EuropeIllicit Cigarettes Illicit Markets Illicit Trade Organized Crime Tax Evasion Tobacco |