JTI Romania: bigger sales, profit on hold

The Romanian arm of Japanese tobacco company JT International estimates to post some 5,200bn ROL (136.8m euros) in turnover this year, up 38% from 2002. “2003 was a much better year for JTI Romania than the previous year. The company took important steps and made a significant financial effort to launch its own distribution system and open a new processing unit. After the losses reported in the last two years, the outlook shows we are likely to break even again in the near future,” Gilda Lazar, corporate affairs director of the company, said. The company’s turnover accounted for 98.6m euros in 2002, while losses topped 1.7m euros, according to the Finance Ministry. ZF