Sputnik News Service
November 1, 2017 Wednesday 10:24 AM UTC


Armenia Ready to Squeeze Other Tomato Suppliers Out of Russian Market
- President



YEREVAN, November 1 (Sputnik) - Armenia is ready to compete with other
suppliers of tomatoes on the Russian market and even push them out,
the country's President Serzh Sargsyan told Sputnik in an interview.

"Certainly," he said in response to a question on whether Armenia was
ready to push well-known tomato producers out of the Russian market.

According to Spayka, Armenia's largest fruit and vegetable producer,
the export of greenhouse tomatoes from Armenia to Russia increased to
30,000 tons per year in 2016-2017.

"You see, when there are problems for one [country], sometimes it
opens opportunities for others. These are what we used last year, and
Russia is also developing this industry [growing tomatoes], but the
market is so big that the increase in the number of players here will
not hurt anyone, it will only benefit," the Armenian president said.

On January 1, 2016, Russia imposed an embargo on the supply of a
number of products from Turkey in response to the downing of the
Russian Su-24 aircraft in Syria by Turkey. The ban on the delivery of
tomatoes from Turkey to Russia was the longest, lasting 1 year and 10
months. On Monday, Russia's food quality watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor
allowed imports of tomatoes from three Turkish enterprises previously
inspected by the Russian agency to resume from November 1.