Proposed budget to escalate tobacco use: Experts

Staff Reporter  :
The proposed national budget for FY 2023-24, if adopted, will once again render tobacco products cheaper than essential commodities. This will escalate tobacco use and raise tobacco-related illness and deaths.
It also deprives 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.
Such issues have been discussed on Monday during a post-budget press conference on tobacco price and tax measures, held at the Tofazzal Hossain Manik Mia auditorium of the National Press Club, jointly organised by research and advocacy organisation PROGGA (Knowledge for Progress) and Anti-tobacco Media Alliance (ATMA).

During the press conference, PROGGA and ATMA informed that the increase in prices of 10 sticks cigarettes ranges from 1.8 per cent to 12.5 per cent. 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 per cent to 71.7 per cent.
Eminent economist and convener of the National Anti-Tobacco Platform, Dr. Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad said, “We strongly demand that the government incorporate such proposals in the final budget to safeguard public health.”
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 per cent. 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.”

The discussants in the event include Syed Yusuf Sadat, Research Fellow, Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), Mortuza Haider Liton, convener of ATMA, Md. Abdus Salam, Program Manager, Campaign for Tobacco-free Kids (CTFK) Bangladesh, and ABM Zubair, Executive Director, PROGGA, and leaders of different anti-tobacco organisations. Nadira Kiron, Chief Reporter, ATN News, and Co-convener of ATMA, hosted the event whereas Md. Hasan Shahriar, Head of Tobacco Control, PROGGA, presented an analysis of the proposed budget and raised demands for final budget.