The expert in economic policies from IDIS Viitorul, Veaceslav Ioniță, stated that the gray market for the sale of petroleum products, especially diesel, is growing. According to the expert, oil companies currently sell almost half of diesel, about 46%, to various companies for their consumption, only that most of these quantities of diesel is not used for consumption, but is sold illegally with no license or authorization that would allow them to sell petroleum products.

”Currently, in Moldova, almost half of the imported diesel is illegally sold. While the state imposed to gas stations a whole series of restrictions and taxes, the street vendors of diesel, illegally and without any permissive act and not paying any taxes, sell almost half of the imported diesel,” writes the expert on his blog.

“In these schemes of illegal sale of petroleum products, some oil companies participate very actively, due to the lack of any control by the competent state authorities,” says Veaceslav Ioniță.

The economist also states that the total volume of the gray and illegal market for the sale of petroleum products exceeds 5 billion lei (236 million euros).

“Since 2015 until now, only diesel of over 20 billion lei (950 million euros) has been sold through these schemes. The failures of the national public budget for this illegal activity of trading petroleum products, without any permissive act, amount to 200 million lei (9.5 million euros) annually. Only for diesel, from 2015 to 2020, the failures of the public budget are about 800 million lei (38 million euros),” the expert claims.

The economic analyst is of the opinion that the liquidation of the illegal trade with petroleum products would allow the increase of the budget revenues by up to 200 million lei (9.5 million euros) annually and will reduce the price of the petroleum product.

“This is one of several emergency measures that would allow the authorities to bring order to the market for petroleum products, to create an appropriate legal and competitive framework that would ultimately lead to the formation of fair prices for all consumers,” says the economist Veaceslav Ioniță.