A bit sarcastic and funny scandal is being developed in Russia due to enormous amount of exotic tropical fruits, invading the market from Belarus. The ban, as a move to offset sanctions, imposed on Russia, clearly prohibits re-export, and that is exactly what Belarus is suspected of by Moscow. Customs reported that astonishing amounts of papaya, kiwi, citruses and apricots, arriving from the neighbor country have doubled for the last half year. The Russian Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor) said Belarus exported some ten thousand tons of kiwi, which definitely do not grow there. The climate of the country is too far from tropical, with average winter temperature at minus three-minus eight degrees centigrade. Meanwhile a popular Russian joke about Belarus says that everything, from Italian shrimps (the country has no sea shores) – to papaya or Iberian ham has been always, in fact, there. We just didn’t know.
