In the Vitebsk region, sellers of seeds and seedlings evaded taxes

At the initiative of the State Control Committee of the Vitebsk region, criminal cases were initiated for tax evasion when selling low-quality seeds and seedlings of horticultural and fruit and vegetable crops through an online store.

During 2018 - 2021 The Regional Committee received complaints from citizens about the sale of low-quality seeds and seedlings of horticultural and fruit and vegetable crops purchased through an online store from private firms in Vitebsk, and sellers evading the satisfaction of buyers' claims.

In order to ensure the protection of the rights of citizens, the appeals were sent for action to the Department of Trade and Services of the Vitebsk City Executive Committee, which protects the rights of consumers.

However, the information contained in the appeals eventually went beyond the scope of consumer protection legislation.

Specialists of the State Control Committee drew attention to a number of interesting coincidences in the appeals.

So, as sellers of low-quality goods, the applicants indicated very similar names of firms, which, moreover, were located at the same address, and the names of their employees also coincided. For the sale of seeds and seedlings, these firms also used the same site on the Internet.

In addition, according to the information of the state institution “Vitebsk Regional State Inspectorate for Seed Production, Quarantine and Plant Protection”, most of the seed material offered on the site was not included in the State Register of Varieties, there were no documents confirming the quality and origin of the goods sold, the office did not have, the office space is not equipped to store seeds and planting material. The firms-sellers were repeatedly brought to administrative responsibility for the violations committed.

These circumstances indicated that these firms-sellers could be created with the aim of “splitting the business” (when, in order to minimize tax liabilities, several small ones are created instead of one large organization, which are actually supervised by one person), the lack of the necessary staff could indicate the involvement of workers without registration labor relations and payment of wages “in envelopes”, and the absence of documents confirming the quality and origin of the products sold indicated its shadow turnover.

At the initiative of the State Control Committee, this information was studied by the Department of Financial Investigations of the State Control Committee of the Republic of Belarus for the Vitebsk Region, as a result of which criminal cases were initiated against the guilty officials of the selling firms for tax evasion in the amount of more than 2 million rubles.