Russian car plants General Motors, Toyota and Nissan, have faced the risk of stopping conveyors due to changes in customs clearance procedures of the components. The FCS converts it to a single office - in Shushary near St. Petersburg, which degrades the logistics of supply and increases the chances of late delivery. The terminal was opened on the territory of private company "National Container Company», controlled by State Duma deputy Vitaly Yuzhilin, which caused an outcry from other container operators in the region. The FCS has already offered an alternative - to create customs posts directly at the car factories, but that is fraught with additional costs.

A letter written on May 4 by the heads of the St. Petersburg plants General Motors (GM), Toyota and Nissan to the head of the Federal Customs Service (FCS) Andrey Belyaninov was received by journalists. The auto-producers wrote that "several major customs posts had been closed in Petersburg, that made the plant urgently change the logistics schemes" and "bear the additional costs" on the delivery of automotive components. In its turn, FCS decided to open a new customs Pushkinsky post in Shushary, near St. Petersburg. The producers wrote, this post was unable to cope with their logistics: more than 2 thousand container ships per month would have to come there, «the road infrastructure in the area» can not provide that.

All this creates a risk of " stalling the manufacture and launch of new models» at the factories in St. Petersburg. GM explained that all modern car factories operate in a mode of just-in-time, when the components arrive at the assembly line in real time and are not stored in the warehouse, so the situation with the supplying of automotive components "worries."

This is for the first time when foreign automobile companies in Russia face serious problems of the components' import. Local administration called the factories of GM, Nissan and Toyota in St. Petersburg the "second Detroit», their total capacity is 160 thousand cars per year (production in 2009 was not more than 20 thousand).

In addition to GM, Nissan and Toyota a plant Hyundai is being built in St. Petersburg - it will be one of the largest foreign auto plants in Russia (150 thousand cars per year). Production started yet in test run mode, but Hyundai also said that "the single customs office in Shushary would cause a lot of discomfort, increase transport costs and complicate the transport situation in the city." Automobile factory Ford is also working in the Leningrad region and has its own customs office.

The Pushkinsky post in Shushary has been opened in a private container terminal of ZAO «Terminal Logistics", which is part of "National Container Company» (it belongs to a group FESCO by Sergey Generalov and First Quantum on an equal footing; according to unofficial sources, it is controlled by State Duma deputy Vitaly Yuzhilin). The press service of the NCC said that the opening of the post in the territory of ZAO "Terminal Logistics" was "the initiative of the customs itself”. But representatives of the NCC's competitors in the St. Petersburg port are extremely concerned about the changes of the auto-components' established logistics, which are a major component of their business.