bdmetronews Desk॥ Health Sector of Dhaka Ahsania Misssion (DAM) has organized a discussion meeting on the importance of imposing a high tobacco tax on 20th April 2019 at 10 a.m. The venue of the event was DAM Health Office (Shyamoli, Dhaka.).
The Speakers said, Increase Tobacco tax will help to save lives and enlarge government revenue. Speakers also stressed to decrease the cigarette tier from 04 to 02 (low and high) and urged to fix low tier cigarette (10 sticks) retail price Tk.50 and impose 60 % supplementary duty and in higher tier (10 sticks) cigarette retail price minimum Tk. 105 and impose 65% supplementary duty. In all cases specific tax would be 5 taka. They also proposed to abolish the filter and non filter tier of bidis and urged to fix one pack non –filtered bidis with 25 sticks MRP tk.35 with 45 % supplementary duty and tk 6 specific exercise duty and MRP of one pack of filtered bidi with 20 sticks should be tk 28 with 45 % supplementary duty and Tk.4.8 specific excise duty.
In case of smokeless tobacco the Speakers proposed tariff value should be abolished from SLT and mixed tax based on MRP should be introduced. The MRP of 10 gram of jorda should be fixed at Tk 35 and MRP of 10 gram of gul should be fixed at Tk 20 on which 45 percent SD should be imposed. The specific duty on these products should be Tk 5 and Tk 3, respectively. They also demanded to impose 15% VAT on all tobacco products and impose 2% health development surcharge.
Former Additional Secretary of Health and Family Welfare Mohammad Ruhul Kuddus, Chief Executive Officer of Savar Municipality Sharaf Uddin Ahmed Chowdhury, Special Correspondent of Jamuna News Sushanta Sinha, Country Manager of Vital Strategies Md. Nasir Uddin, Head of Program, Voice, Ajmal Hossain and Khodoker Reaz Hossain , Director Program of Gram Bangla Unnayan Committee spoke in program as honorable guests. Iqbal Masud, Director, Health Sector of DAM presided over the meeting while Md. Mukhlesur Rahman, Assistant Director and Project Coordinator of DAM TC Project presented the key note paper.
Representatives from different anti-tobacco organizations and DAM’s Health Sector Projects participated in the program and took part in open discussion.
