HAMBURG (dpa) – They are hidden inside upholstered furniture or among noodles, or they are lying behind crates of woks or tea sets. And they are increasing in number.
Smuggled cigarettes from China are flooding the European market. “We are in the midst of a gigantic wave. Organised crime has expanded this booming market,” says Michael Kramer of the Hamburg customs authority.In 1999, some 690 million contraband cigarettes were seized by customs agents throughout Germany. Last year, according to customs officials in Cologne, the figure was 1.1 billion such cigarettes. “This means lost tax revenues of up to two billion marks (900 million dollars),” Kramer reports.The Hamburg financial authority, which is also responsible for the north German states of Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Pomerania, said that in 1999 some 125 million cigarettes were seized. Last year, the figure reached 350 million. Of these, 280 million were counterfeited brands.The trend is now moving away from legally manufactured and exported cigarettes which then, via illegal channels to evade taxes, find their way to the black market in Germany. Now, two out of three contraband cigarettes which are seized are also counterfeits made in the Far East. And the figure is rising.“Brand name pirates in China have set up entire factories which they are using to flood the European market with,” Kramer says. Most of the “Made in China” cigarettes seized in the Hamburg port are meant for the British market. This is evidenced by the fact that the counterfeit brands are mainly “Benson & Hedges” and “Regal”. “In England, the tobacco tax is about 20 per cent above that in Germany,” Kramer reports.Given that production costs in China are less than one mark (45 U.S. cents) per package, while the regular price in the store is around 13 marks, then the counterfeiters, selling at eight marks a package are raking in “incredible profits like in drug trafficking”.Such profits are what create the “incentive for the creation of dangerous criminal structures”, Kramer adds.According to the German Cigarette Industry Federation, about seven per cent of the cigarettes smoked in Germany reach the market via illegal channels. In England, the figure is 25 per cent.The seized counterfeit cigarettes from China deviate from the legal brands in the type of tobacco mixtures used. “But the packaging is outstandingly produced. There are tiny differences in the printing but they are scarcely recognisable,” federation spokesman Ernst Brueckner says.Every counterfeit cigarette serves to saturate the market for tobocco items legally produced in Germany. In addition, the image of European manufactures gets damaged. As a result, the industry is trying to help customs and police authorities in the battle against the contraband cigarette mafia.The federation has even set aside rewards totalling 250,000 marks (119,000 dollars) per year for people who tip off the authorities. “We suffer as much as the tax people do,” Brueckner says about the revenues lost due to the illegal cigarettes.
