The State Committee of Economic Competition Protection (SCECP) has published the results of their survey in the market of cheese. The reason of this survey was the recent growth of cheese prices in the market, i.e. two months ago the prices of cheese grew by 35-40%. The most interesting thing in the report published by the SCECP is not the reason of the cheese price growth, but something else. Together with other information this committee has published the information concerning the market of cheese, which it received from the cheese production companies. “The committee has also found out that the selected 16 companies provide the 80% of the cheese production capacity. However, if we compare this information with the information of the national statistics service, it turns out that this capacity is 7-8%,” writes the official statement of the SCECP. It means that the 16 largest cheese production companies have reduced the real circulation capacities by 10 times. It means that the shadow and hidden circulation in the market of cheese is rather big. The strangest thing is that this information is published by a state institution, the first function of which is to struggle against the reasons of shady deals in the economy and monopolies. The information published by the SCECP is very special due to this part and this situation could be true for the other sectors of the economy as well. The problem is that the National Statistics Service works with companies with the same mechanisms. In other words, if the producers of cheese are reducing the real capacity of their production in their reports to this state institution, we may assume that the other sectors are doing the same too. In other words, we should be thankful to the SCECP for approving the information and experts’ opinions about the real situation of the economy.
