Will carbonated soft drinks be subject to excise tax?

The draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Special Consumption Tax of the Ministry of Finance has just added that non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks will be taxed with special consumption tax (SCT) at the rate of: ten%.

The Ministry of Finance has just posted the draft on its website Law Amending the Law on Special Consumption Tax for public comment. According to this draft, non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks will be taxed with special consumption tax (SCT) at the rate of 10%. Among non-alcoholic beverages, only carbonated drinks are subject to this tax.

If this draft is approved, carbonated soft drinks will accompany beer, wine, cars, yachts and luxury services such as golf or massage, which are traditional objects of excise tax.

The main reason that the drafting agency gave when proposing excise tax on non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks is: “non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks have great harms to users’ health such as obesity, diabetes, and diseases of the heart. cardiovascular” .

According to statistics in 2010, the obesity rate for children aged 5 to 19 is also quite high: The overall rate in this group is 8.5%; 18.2% in the city; 7.9% in rural areas, however, in big cities like Ho Chi Minh City is very high: 34.5%.

Overweight and obesity are risk factors for many non-communicable diseases such as: cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, stroke, atherosclerosis and coronary occlusion, myocardial infarction; risk of type 2 diabetes and some cancers such as gallbladder cancer, breast cancer, colon cancer, prostate cancer and kidney cancer…

According to studies by the World Health Organization (WHO), the abuse of soft drinks will lead to obesity and diabetes. According to the Health Promotion Fund Victoria, Australia, numerous studies have demonstrated that soft drink use is associated with weight gain and obesity, and many other adverse health effects including cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

Therefore, in order to orient and limit the consumption of sugary drinks, countries in the region have collected special consumption tax on soft drinks, the representative of the Ministry of Finance specifically cited Thailand’s regulations. non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks are subject to the tax rate of 25% or $0.024 per 440cc bottle; carbonated soft drinks, at 20% or $0.011/440cc bottle.

Laos collects excise tax on non-alcoholic carbonated soft drinks at the rate of 5% and energy drinks at the rate of 10%; Cambodia collects a 10% excise tax on soft drinks.

However, it must be added that this tax is also facing mixed opinions and now many countries are tending to eliminate the excise tax on soft drinks.

 

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Post Author: Luật DHP