Metinvest, the largest mining and metallurgical holding company in Ukraine, has announced that the Russian customs authorities tightened inspection of metal products being exported to Russia on August 13, the Interfax Ukraine news agency reports.
"Additional customs control measures in relation to products of Metinvest began on August 13. Primarily, this involves continuous examination and reweighing of all incoming metal," the holding company told the news agency.
According to the holding company, customs inspection of the products of Metinvest and other importers were previously performed selectively, with only a few railcars with the company's products inspected per quarter.
"In addition, the Russian customs has begun requiring sampling of products in some cases, as a result of which the integrity of metal products is violated. All this results in serious financial losses for our company,” the holding company said.
Full authentication of certificates of origin for metal products that are being imported from Ukraine has also begun, with the products being sent to Moscow for examination. Exporters expect this process to take up to two months. The authenticity of certificates of origin for Metinvest’s products had previously never been in question, the company emphasizes.
As a result, queues are being formed at Russian customs offices and deadlines for delivery of goods from Ukraine to Russia are being missed.
The main shareholders of Metinvest are the SCM group (71.25%) and the Smart Holding company (23.75%), which jointly control the holding company.
As reported, the Federation of Employers of Ukraine earlier announced that the Russian Customs Service added all Ukrainian exporters to its risk list on August 14, 2013, virtually blocking all imports from Ukraine indefinitely. The federation believes that Ukraine’s losses from these Russian actions could reach USD 2-2.5 billion in the second half of this year alone.
