http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2044800/Denmark-imposes-fat-tax-butter-bid-end-nations-unhealthy-eating-habits.html?printingPage=true
Oct. 4, 2011
Denmark has imposed a ‘fat tax’ on foods such as butter and oil in a bid to curb the nation’s unhealthy eating habits.
The Scandinavian country introduced the tax, of 16 kroner (£1.84) per kilogram (2.2lbs) of saturated fat in a product.
Ole Linnet Juul, food director at Denmark’s Confederation of Industries, said the tax will increase the price of a burger by around nine pence and raise the price of a small package of butter by around 25pence.
On the rise: The cost of burgers and hot dogs in Denmark will go up after the Government implemented a new ‘fat tax’ on some foods
The tax was approved by large majority in a parliament in March as a move to help increase the average life expectancy of Danes.
Denmark, like some other European countries, already has higher fees on sugar, chocolates and soft drinks, but Linnet Juul said he believes the country is the first in the world to tax fatty foods.
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In September, Hungary introduced a new tax popularly known as the ‘Hamburger Law’, but that only involves higher taxes on soft drinks, pastries, salty snacks and food flavourings.
Complex: Ole Linnet Juul said the new tax involves the percentage of fat used in making the product, rather than the amount in the end product
The outgoing conservative Danish government planned the fat tax as part of a goal to increase the average life expectancy of Danes, currently below the OECD average at 79 years, by three years over the next 10 years.
‘Higher fees on sugar, fat and tobacco is an important step on the way toward a higher average life expectancy in Denmark,’ health minister Jakob Axel Nielsen said when he introduced the idea in 2009, because ‘saturated fats can cause cardiovascular disease and cancer.’
Linnet Juul said the tax mechanism is very complex, involving tax rates on the percentage of fat used in making a product rather than the percentage that is in the end-product.
As such, only the arrangements of how companies should handle the tax payments could cost Danish businesses about £18 million in the first year, he said.
Linnet Juul’s organisation is pressuring politicians to simplify the tax, but said he is unsure what will happen when the new, centre-left government takes office.