BSE threatens domestic leather producers with foreign run on cowhides

Domestic leather makers fear the mad cow crisis may ruin their operation. The threat of BSE has turned West European leather producers to Poland in search of supplies, increasing the demand for cowhide, raising prices, and thus making business unprofitable for domestic leather makers. As a result the Polish Chamber of Leather Industry (PCLI) intends to ask the Economy and Agriculture Ministries to restrict cowhide exports, which for the last two years have been traded freely. According to deputy PCLI president Jan Konieczny, agreements with the EU permit Poland to issue such an embargo in case of significant risks to the state. Leather makers also complain about the high cost of cowhides imported from the East, as Russia, Ukraine and Belarus introduced 20% export tariffs recently. The sector is likewise hurt by lowered demand from domestic shoe producers, whose business has slumped largely as a result of the Russian economic meltdown in 1998, which destroyed Polish shoe exports to the East. (Rzeczpospolita, p.B1) M.K.