Staff Reporter:
The proposed national budget for FY 2023-24, if adopted, will once again render tobacco products cheaper than essential commodities, experts observed.
This issue was discussed on Monday during a post-budget press conference on tobacco price and tax measures, held at Tofazzal Hossain Manik Mia auditorium of the press club, said a press release.
Research and advocacy organization PROGGA (Knowledge for Progress) and Anti-tobacco Media Alli-ance (ATMA) jointly organized the program.
This will raise tobacco-related illness and deaths and would deprive the government of the opportunity to earn additional revenue, and only benefit tobacco companies.
Economists and anti-tobacco leaders have raised demand for introducing specific supplementary duty (SD) to effectively raise the prices of tobacco products in the final budget.
During the press conference, PROGGA and ATMA informed that the increase in prices of 10 sticks ciga-rettes ranges from 1.8 percent to 12.5 percent.
However, according to the government reports, the year-on-year increase in the prices of loose wheat flour (atta), broiler chicken, sugar, eggs, powder milk, and red lentil ranges from 14.5 percent to 71.7 percent.
As a result, tobacco products will become much cheaper compared to other essential commodities, which will encourage people to get hooked on smoking, and thus threatening public health.
The proposed budget has not raised the prices of bidi. This is the fourth consecutive time the budget has kept the retail price of bidi unchanged and the seventh consecutive time not to raise the SD imposed on bidi.
The prices of per gram jarda and gul have been raised by 50 paisa and 30 paisa respectively and the SDs have been kept unchanged.
It was also informed during the press conference that the proposed budget raised retail prices of tobacco products without increasing the SD imposed on those products. This will only increase the profits of to-bacco companies but deprive the government of the opportunity to earn additional revenue, it said.
As per the proposals of anti-tobacco organizations, only by introducing 65 percent of SD in the low-tier cigarettes, the government can earn at least BDT 17 billion as additional revenue. As the proposed budg-et has set the SD on the low tier of cigarettes at only 58 percent, the companies will pocket at least BDT 4.86 billion as additional profit.
In his speech as the chief guest of the event, eminent economist and convener of the National Anti-Tobacco Platform, Dr. Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad said, “The budget does not reflect any of the pro-posals that we have put forth regarding a reform of the tobacco tax structure.
“We strongly demand that the government incorporate such proposals in the final budget to safeguard public health,” he said.
Dr Mahfuz Kabir, Research Director of Bangladesh Institute of International and Strategic Studies (BIISS), said, “There is an ample opportunity to raise additional revenue by hiking the SD on the low tier of cigarettes to 65 percent. The proposed budget has replaced the ad-valorem system with specific taxes on petroleum products, which should also be followed in case of tobacco products to benefit both the economy and public health.”
