"Tropical" Mafia

The banana is one of the visual patterns, confirming the fact of having a monopoly on the import of certain goods and dictate of the prices at the discretion of mafias who control the market. The state represented by the Antimonopoly and Consumer Protection Service has never aroused cases on violation of antitrust laws.

Banana is one of the few fruits consistently sold independently of the season at a fixed price - not less than 2 manat per 1 kilogram.

According to the State Customs Committee (SCC), for the 6 months of this year Azerbaijan was delivered 4 115.4 tons of this tropical fruit with registration at the border at $ 0.92 (72 kopecks) per 1 kg. If you trust the statistics, the annual consumption of this product is not more than 1 kg of bananas per capita: in 2013 there were imported 8,954.4 tons of bananas. For comparison, there are examples of other countries where the consumption is much more. In Russia, the per capita accounts for more than 8 kg, in Turkey - 3 kg, and in Iran - about 5 kg.

The same data of SCC show that the volume of import of the commodity can be arranged at the discretion of the "controller". In 2012, customs dramatically "cut" the data on the import of bananas, legal import of which was only 1 472.1 tons.

In 2009-2010, the local and foreign press often wrote about the mafias that control customs operations. Then an American company Cool Zone Caspian Ltd tried to bring bananas to Azerbaijan through Georgia. The commodity waiting for permission from the local monopoly, went rotten in the refrigerator without receiving a "permission from above." It is noteworthy that in 2010, customs officials became generous in figures and released data on imports unseen until then - 19 241.8 tons of bananas, although the shops and the prices looked like in the previous years.

In Azerbaijan the import of bananas and other tropical and subtropical fruits is carried out by Alliance Trans. The wholesale of the fruit imported is arranged by the trading base Meyveli in Baku, which belongs to the same group.

Into neighboring Georgia, where customs are not corrupt and entrepreneurs do not complain of monopoly symptoms, for the first nine months of this year bananas totaling $ 14.4 million were imported. In this country, according to the Statistical Office, the volume of import of bananas fluctuated in 2010-2012 in the range of $ 14 - 15 million and in 2013 reached $ 18.3 million.

In 2012, in Armenia, where the population is three times less than in Azerbaijan, banana imports amounted to 12 500 tons, and in the past year – 9 880 tons.

According to estimates of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN, Azerbaijan is among the group of countries where the consumption of bananas per capita is 1.7 kg. In other words, the annual consumption of bananas is about 17 000 tons. That is, even according to official data, illicit trafficking of the commodity across the country is estimated at $ 20 million. --08B--