Shawdesh Desk:

People from various walks of life have demanded increasing the prices of cigarettes and other tobacco products through imposing specific supplementary duties on the products.

The demand came from a human chain formed virtually on Sunday. People of different professions joined the human chain through social media apps facebook.

They demanded raising the prices of cigarettes and other tobacco products through imposing specific supplementary duties in the upcoming FY 2022-23 national budget.

In the virtual human chain, the participants uploaded their pictures holding festoons and placards with the demands and posted them using #RaiseTaxSaveLivesBD hashtags.

The event was organized by the research and advocacy organization PROGGA (Knowledge for Progress) with support from Campaign for Tobacco-free Kids (CTFK).

Anti-tobacco organizations demand that in the upcoming budget, the retail price for the low-tier cigarettes should be set at taka 50 for 10 sticks, followed by taka 32.50 as specific supplementary duty (SD). In the medium-tier, the retail price should be set at taka 75 and supplementary duty at BDT 48.75.

Addressing the event, ABM Zubair, Executive Director of the PROGGA said, “Increasing tobacco products’ prices by imposing specific supplementary duties would raise government revenues and reduce tobacco-related deaths and losses.”