Call for doubling of cigarette tax in Hong Kong

A Hong Kong-based anti-tobacco-smoking pressure group is calling on the government to double the tax it imposes on cigarettes in a bid to get more smokers to quit their habit, according to a story by Elizabeth Cheung for the South China Morning Post.

Doubling cigarette taxes would reportedly cause the price of these products to rise from about HK$55 to HK$93.

The Council on Smoking and Health, which is calling for the tax hike, believes the increase would cut the smoking rate from 10.7 percent of over 15-year-olds – about 650,000 people – to between 9.5 and 9.9 percent in one to two years.

Tobacco tax in the city was raised by 300 percent in 1983, which led to a 4.6 percent fall in the number of smokers over two years to 18.7 percent.

Cigarette tax has gone unchanged in 12 budgets since 1999, though there have been two huge increases during this period: 50 percent in 2009 and 41.5 percent in 2011.