Trade Advisory Service for Russia and CIS

If the complexities involved in trading with Russia and CIS countries have deterred you from entering those potentially lucrative markets, a new trade and logistics consultancy service may be able to help. It has been introduced by an Anglo-Russian freight business that is opening up its specialist expertise in the region to other firms. Russia is the UK's 21st largest trading partner, with total trade in goods and services between it and the UK valued at over £150 billion per annum, so it is worth consideration for international traders.

FSM Logistics Ltd (fsmlogistics.com) offers freight forwarding and logistics services globally, with a particularly deep understanding of the former Soviet Union (FSU) having been one of the first international logistics providers to establish itself in Russia following the unravelling of the USSR in the 1990s.

Alfred Stienen, FSM Logistics

Alfred Stienen, director of Basildon-based FSM Logistics, said that for some businesses, Brexit has made trading with traditional markets in the EU much more complicated, and many are looking at markets further afield, but that certain areas are tricker than others. He said, “Russia and the CIS countries have a large middle class; and GDP across the region has been rising for many years, increasing the spending power of the nations’ populations, for the potential benefit of UK traders. But, many businesses are dissuaded from considering trade with these markets as they are portrayed as impenetrable – ‘a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma’, according to Winston Churchill, which is an impression that we want to correct, and encourage UK traders to think again.”

FSM Logistics has worked in the Russian and CIS markets for over 30 years and has its own logistics centres in seven locations across Russia and freight hubs in Georgia, Kazakhstan and Ukraine. In the early 1990s, Alfred Stienen set up offices in Moscow, one of the first UK forwarding companies to explore the market. His new trade and logistics consultancy service is a full value-added support operation for Anglo-Russian freight, including advice on fiscal, tax, insurance, credit and Customs; multilingual staff in all offices; documentation, such as letters of credit, and Certificates of Origin, and even armed-escorts for highly valuable cargoes, complementing its overland trailer, oceanfreight and airfreight services.

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