Cross-border trade still flourishing in eastern Poland

The Połowce border checkpoint with Peschatka in Belarus. A lot of cross-border trade runs through smaller border crossings like the one pictured. Photo: cc/wikimedia/Upior polnocy

Over the past years, cross-border trade in areas close to Poland’s borders with Ukraine, Belarus and Russia’s Kaliningrad Oblast has been continuously growing.

According to data from the Central Statistical Office, shoppers from across the eastern border spent as much as 8.2 billion zloty (about 2 billion euro) in Poland in 2013. The figure was 23.4 percent higher than the one recorded in 2012.

Mostly Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians shop in Poland due to cheaper goods prices in the country, with an additional VAT rebate also fuelling sales further. Furthermore, Ukrainians and Russians living in areas near the Polish border do not need visas to come to the closest areas of Poland, reports Gazeta Wyborcza.

Poles living in the east of the country also cross the border to do some shopping, but their spending is not as significant. In 2013 it amounted to 698 million zloty (about 168 million euro).

The difficult situation in Ukraine does not seem to negatively influence cross-border trade with Poland. The number of people crossing the border has even grown by 5 percent year-on-year in the first half of 2014.

Slawomir Godyn from Korczowa Dolina, a shopping centre located just next to the Polish-Ukrainian border crossing, told the newspaper that the only decline in the number of Ukrainian customers was recorded at the time of the most violent clashes in Kiev. Traffic has now returned to previous levels, he said.

Growth of border traffic was also recorded on the border with Russia, by 18 percent year-on-year. It slightly declined on the Belarusian border, by 4 percent year-on-year, possibly because of more cumbersome visa procedures. (kw/jb)