Zastava Oruzje Records Large Growth of Exports to USA – Export of 18,000 Semi-Automatic Rifles Planned, 31,500 Sold

The factory Zastava Oruzje from Kragujevac, despite the difficulties caused by the coronavirus pandemic, increased its sales in the local and foreign markets in 2020 by around 6%, and slightly under 50,000 rifles were exported throughout the world.

According to the Balkanska Bezbedonosna Mreza portal, the best sales are those of semi-automatic rifles in the USA, whereas, of the military program, the best-selling product is the automatic rifle M05.

– The export of hunting and sports arms is quadrupled, and the export of military arms has dropped by around 23%. The value of the arms exports is around EUR 30.5 million. The sale to the Serbian military and police forces has dropped by 27% and the sales of hunting and sports arms in the local market have grown by around 8% – says the business report of Zastava Oruzje for 2020, as reported by said portal.

It is added that the planned production was not realized due to the lack of resources and “the frequent changes to the operating plans made by the marketing department”, but also the lack of presence of the employees, due to the coronavirus infections.

An example is cited which says that, of the planned 34,000 rifles of various calibers, around 11,000 were produced.

In the civilian market, primarily the US one, where Zastava’s products have a good reputation, the sale of 18,000 semi-automatic rifles is planned, and as many as 31,500 were sold.

The Kragujevac arms producer also exports several types of hunting rifles, guns, engraved hunting rifles and the civilian version of the military sniper rifle M-93 “Crna Strela” to the American market.

In the US territory, there are around 170 authorized dealers of Serbian arms from Kragujevac, through the official distributor Zastava Arms USA.

Due to the drop in the demand in the global market, the production of automatic rifles suffered as well.

– Judging by the advance payments that have been made, the biggest purchasers in Serbia are Jugoimport SDPR, the Ministry of Defense, VTI and Krusik Valjevo. The biggest advance payments from abroad were made by foreign purchasers from Cyprus, Great Britain and Slovakia. Advance payments were also made by mediators Larcom Holding, Aramco Security, VIP Global and Karso Limited. The realization of the arrangement with Saudi Arabia was expected to start in the second quarter of 2020, but this didn’t happen, so the date has been moved to 2021 – the report says.

Zastava oružje a.d. Kragujevac

Ministarstvo odbrane Republike Srbije

Jugoimport-SDPR Beograd

Krušik - fabrika lovačke municije Valjevo

Vojnotehnički institut VTI Beograd

Zastava Arms Usa

VTI

Krušik

Larcom Holding

Aramco Security

VIP Global

Karso Limited

arms

weapons

automatic rifles

semi automatic rifles

sales

financial operations

export

exports