Belarus restricted the import of the Russian beer.

While politicians and officials spend their time, thinking over budget problems and other virtual details of the Unified State of Russia and Belarus, Russian producers think, what is the best thing to do with the abundance of cheap Byelorussian goods on the Russian market. We have the Russian Transport Union, the Fuel Union, even the Book Union.

All lobbyist needs are focused in an adequate union, which allows its leadership to lobby the interests of an industrial branch in the government, parliament and local authorities. The Union of Russian Brewers - wrote a letter to Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov to introduce measures to limit beer imports into Russia from Belarus.

Russian beer-makers believe that limiting the import of the Byelorussian beer only was far from being enough. This is not the first time the brewers have called for such measures. Last year, the association asked the government's commission on anti-dumping measures to impose restrictions on beer imports from Belarus after Belarus introduced restrictions on imports of Russian beer. In December of 2002 beer lobbyists asked Finance Minister Aleksey Kudrin to institute tough restrictions for the import of the Belarussian beer to Russia.

The Russian import of beer considerably dropped, which caused damage to the Russian economy and even imperiled its economic security.

For some reason, the government does not pay any attention to this relevant issue.

17 January, 2003