Source: Agência Estado, March 24, 2004

By Leonencio Nossa

Entrepreneur Emerson Kapaz, from the Brazilian Institute of Ethics in Competition (ETCO), said recently that President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva assured the entity, during a meeting this afternoon, that he will create a working group to analyze a document prepared by the PT and by the Institute containing proposals to combat piracy.

The group should be made up of representatives from the ministries of Finance, Justice, Mines and Energy and the Presidency's Civil House. Kapaz estimates that the government stops raising about R $ 160 billion annually due to smuggling and counterfeiting.

According to him, piracy in the CD sector reaches 60% of the disc market. The fuels, cigarettes, pens, soft drinks and beer sectors are also affected by tax evasion and counterfeiting. The federal tax evasion of the beer sector, according to a document delivered today to the president by the ETCO Institute, reaches R $ 305 million and the state tax, to R $ 415 million.

Tobacco companies also face problems with smuggling. Tax evasion in the sector adds up to R $ 1,4 billion per year, with cigarette smuggling and counterfeiting and tax evasion. Kapaz also stressed that the working group that the president intends to install in the coming weeks to study solutions to combat piracy, should work together with the members of CPI dos Combustíveis.

One of the figures raised by the parliamentary commission, according to Kapaz, indicates that the frauds committed by the fuel mafia cause losses of about R $ 10 billion per year. "The president showed attention to the problem and ensured that the government remained committed to fighting illegal trade," reported Kapaz. "There is no point in Pams growing again if the problem is not resolved," he said. (Leonencio Nossa)