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Wholesalers claim that one third or even as much as half of the sugar sold in Estonia may be illegal, the business daily Aripaev says.
Up to half of sugar sold in Estonia may be illegal - newspaper
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The Tax and Customs Board estimates that sugar-related value added tax fraud left a hole of approximately 225 million euros in budget revenue last year.
The tax authority's investigation department has in the course of looking into large-scale tax fraud discovered increasingly more persons connected with illicit sugar trade.
«We assess such cases of fraud primarily by type of tax and the possible VAT shortfall in 2012 was according to the tax board's calculations 220-225 million euros,» deputy head of the investigation department Marko Ratt said.
Sugar wholesalers say that the illegal sugar business makes itself felt on their sales figures and volumes. «I can confirm that our company has since 2011 lost 80 percent of the previous sugar sale volume,» a wholesaler told the paper.
According to sugar sellers, illegal sugar and tax fraud is an issue not solely in Estonia but in whole eastern Europe.