Vietnam to raise special tobacco taxes

Vietnamese lawmakers have agreed to raise the special consumption tax imposed on tobacco, beer and spirits from 2016, according to a story in VietnamPlus.

They accepted a proposal put forward at a National Assembly Standing Committee meeting by the chairman of the Committee on Financial and Budgetary Affairs, Phung Quoc Hien, that a 70 percent tax be imposed on tobacco from January 1, 2016, and a 75 percent tax from January 1, 2018. The current rate is 65 percent.

Vietnam is said to have about 15 million smokers and a death toll from cigarettes that is expected to rise from the 40,000 of 2008 to 50,000 by 2023.

Last year, the prime minister approved a national strategy on tobacco harm control and prevention that has a target of reducing smoking among young people from the current rate of 26 percent to 18 percent by 2020.

The strategy targets reducing the male smoking rate to 39 percent and the female rate to 1.4 percent.