The compact disc market in Armenia is controlled by high-ranking officials, with certain corrupt law enforcers forcing undesirables out of the market, Director of Disc World retail chain Karen Qupelian told journalists on Tuesday.
He told ArmInfo that he was once fined for an alleged attempt to sell porno movies.
Qupelian said that in Oct 2012 the Government decreed that starting from Apr 18 2013 all CDs and DVDs should bear an excise stamp (costing 7.5 AMD or $0.02), but in Armenia, where Internet users have free access to movies, music, computer programs and games, this is a senseless measure. The only way-out here is that they should be forced to pay for the content they download from the Internet.
Director of Hi-Fi retail chain Artashes Bostanjyan said that once the excise stamp is introduced, the average price of CDs in Armenia will jump from 500-3,000 AMD to 5,000-6,000 AMD. "In such a situation our CD market will simply die," Bostanjyan said, adding that only one company has managed to sell excised CDs in the last six months.
On the other hand, there is no chance to acquire excise labels for the compact discs available in the stock, because for that purpose it is necessary to sign relevant agreements with foreign copyright holders and license holders of intellectual property items, receive certificates of authenticity at the Intellectual Property Agency of the Armenian Economy Ministry and then to present them to the taxation bodies, which, in turn, provide the excise labels.
Nevertheless, David Hanoyan, Head of the Reco-Records company, agreed that in case of observing the game rules in the market, the introduction of compulsory excise labels will lead to the situation that the sellers will be unable to evade tax obligations and will observe the legislative standards on intellectual property protection.
No specific data about the output of the Armenian market of compact discs were given. Armenia lacks official statistics on production, import and export of these products.