- Published: 23/08/2012 at 12:00 AM
I welcome this new taxation by the government and hope authorities extend this policy against tobacco products and alcohol.
Nobody can prove that smoking tobacco brings any benefit to human lives and society. A target year for a complete ban on smoking should be set. Until then, prohibitively higher tax hikes should be implemented year by year. Such a measure would gradually destroy business and employment related to tobacco products until a complete ban is in place.
Drinking alcoholic beverages is part of traditional culture and one of the big enjoyments of life. Present alcohol control laws are not effective because people don't have the conscience and morals to obey them. Instead, new legislation should increase punishments without bail for wrongdoings under the influence of alcohol, from traffic violations to murder cases. This measure will deter drinkers from drinking too much.
RH SUGALamphun
Billboards are so ugly
Re: ''City Hall lax on billboards'' (Postbag, Aug 21).
Hurrah to Josephus for his scary comments about Bangkok billboards. I still recall returning to Bangkok after several years away and the hideous shock of being bombarded on every highway with ugly billboards. Does someone have to die as a result of neglect before notice is taken?
Many visitors on arrival have remarked: ''What's with the ugly billboards? We banned those years ago.'' I can only reply that businesses have probably discovered a way of spreading tea money without responsibility.
Before I left Washington state 25 years ago, its citizens became so incensed that highway billboards were blighting the beautiful scenery that all of them were banned after a push to boycott the companies responsible. They are gone now.
But here in Thailand the ugly things get larger and larger and now spread down the highways, with hardly a hill or beautiful wat visible for want of one.
Who has the nerve any longer to say ''beautiful Thailand''?
JAC Hua Hin
Rice policy off target
Re: ''Rice pledging scheme grilled'' (Business, Aug 20).
Commerce permanent secretary Yanyong Phuangrach defends the government's rice pledging scheme, but his analysis is fatally flawed and should be corrected before drawing any conclusions.
He gives the government credit for global prices of Thai rice going up, but droughts this year in the United States and India have severely affected those two countries' rice output, and both are major rice exporters. Given that prices for Thai 5% white rice have risen by only 11% from last year, the drought alone would have accounted for much of the rise.
Presumably the government wants to aid the poorer farmers, not those who are already wealthy. Thus, we should measure the extent to which incomes of low-income farm families rose, not the income of any farmer, regardless of financial standing. But since the government deliberately put no cap on the payout any farmer can receive, it's very likely that the rich have become massively richer simply because they had larger plots.
Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra now has 11.37 million tonnes of rice that she is unwilling to sell at market prices. What is the cost of storage, including spoilage? The US Department of Agriculture forecasts that for the first time in decades Thailand will no longer be the world's largest rice exporter, while rice exports over the first half of 2012 are down by 45% from the same period last year, with export values dropping by 35%.
Instead of superficial, unsustainable fixes like the rice scheme, PM Yingluck would be far more worthy of praise if she focused on long-term, sustainable solutions. For example, our rice productivity badly trails anybody worth mentioning; we are now 21st in the world behind the likes of Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, the Philippines, India and Myanmar. Boosting productivity by even 10% a year would be a real achievement that would truly help the poor who support her and her brother come hell or high water.
BURIN KANTABUTRA
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Share your thoughts
- Discussion 1 : 23/08/2012 at 08:39 PM
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rotorr #3 wrote "people with free minds will do as they wish " so someone who smokes and drinks alcohol has a free mind? I would call a spade a spade and say he has an enslaved mind. Freedom is not doing what you want, it is being free from the urge of doing what you want. It's real freedom, not perceived freedom.
- Discussion 2 : 23/08/2012 at 03:01 PM
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I detest smoking but would defend the right of anyone who wishes to smoke to do so. Only proviso is don't let it interfere with non-smokers or the environment. I also defend the right of tobacco companies to use their logos. People need to learn to be mature and make choices for themselves and not have them imposed by governments. And forget about raising the age to buy tobacco. If 18 is old enough to join the army or police and legally kill people, then they are old enough, (but rather stupid), to smoke.
- Discussion 3 : 23/08/2012 at 01:53 PM
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Sorry Rh Suga whilst you intentions are admirable your methods are flawed.The people you would hit the most are the poor.If you have never smoked you will not understand but smoking is a sedative as is alcohol drunk in moderation.The best way by far to stop these two habits is education,Like other writers in this discussion I smoke 60 a day.The thing that stopped me, because I enjoyed it,was the threat of cancer and coronary disease.Your government will not it seem take advice from better informed countries.The poor will always find a way to afford these two drugs.
- Discussion 4 : 23/08/2012 at 01:21 PM
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Sin Taxes
so hike up the taxes good idea keep hiking them so it becomes more profitable and less dangerous to smuggle alcohol and cigarettes then drugs and arms
i see a request in the near future from customs and border units for more money to suppress the smuggling and the police will now have new opportunities to check bar and shop owners for duty paid products
cynical yes but it don't make it less true !!!!
- Discussion 5 : 23/08/2012 at 12:14 PM
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First raising the minimum wage only to take the added amount back by raising tax on tobacco and liquor. Brilliant!
- Discussion 6 : 23/08/2012 at 10:32 AM
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Disc 1:Hope so,don,t believe it.No change till they are able to think and analyse.A change in the educational system is needed.Nothing will happen in the next 20 years.Disc 2:wish this would be true.Average yield about no more than 500kg a rai.This should be policy of the government to raise the yield in stead of the rice pledging scheme which is a complete failure.
- Discussion 7 : 23/08/2012 at 09:38 AM
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While I personally dislike tobacco use (a close relative died of lung cancer) banning it would be even less effective than banning other drugs (although smugglers and corrupt officials would be very happy).
- Discussion 8 : 23/08/2012 at 08:57 AM
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@Sin Taxes. Kuhn Suga think carefully about what you are saying, do you really want the government intruding into the lives of adults to that degree? I'm guessing you're Thai and have never lived in a Country where the government usurps the right to make adult choices? Things like motorcycle taxis, buying medicines without a doctors prescription, street food vendors, keeping a chicken for eggs, most home businesses, fun nightlife and even drinking a beer on the beach are among the thousands of things you have and can do in Thailand which we are not allowed to do or have in the West. Be careful what what you wish for, you just might get it.
- Discussion 9 : 23/08/2012 at 08:19 AM
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RE Sin taxes a good idea
RH Suga wants a complete ban on tobacco products for ever and as soon as possible.
He mentions that drinking alcohol is a tradition and is one of the big enjoyments of life. So is smoking for some people as is chewing betel nut which I personally find vile and revolting.
My Mother in law and many of her friends chew betel but they are comfortable and happy with that so who am I to interfere in their plaesure.
My wife and many of her friends smoke and enjoy it but I am trying to get her to stop and she is but slowly.
For me, I enjoy a glass or two of SangSom, ice and soda most evenings but I would never force my choices and objections on anyone.
I used to be a heavy smoker some 40 years ago by my own choice and quit again by my own choice and did and still do not need any persons, groups or organisations to ram their unwanted opinions down my throat.
Don't force your opinions on anyone else.
- Discussion 10 : 23/08/2012 at 08:01 AM
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guns are strictly controlled, but many people have them and carry them illegally, the restrictions don't work. Drugs are illegal, but are readily available, the restrictions are not working. If you ban tobacco sales, it will still be available....your right, the restrictions will not work. even the present restrictions on alcohol don't work outside of large companies that use computerized cash registers, again, the restrictions don't work, the truth is that you cannot regulate people into doing as you wish, people with free minds will do as they wish no matter what they are told to do.
- Discussion 11 : 23/08/2012 at 07:49 AM
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If the government reall wanted to help poor farmers, it should only allow the small farmers to enter the rice pledging scheme. Big and rich farms or corporations should be banned from entering it.
Also, there should be limits as to how much rice can be pledged at high prices. If say one rai of land yields one tonne of rice, then maybe there should be a 10 tonne cap per farmer.
Letting everyone enter the scheme just breeds corruption, as many will actually import cheap foreign rice and enter it into the fatally flawed scheme.
- Discussion 12 : 23/08/2012 at 06:56 AM
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I feel sure that the government's voter base will turn against the government and their hero one day. The government is spending and borrowing so much money while reducing the tax of the rich corporate world, that it will have to find more ways to raise tax. Generally, the government's voters are too poor to pay income tax, but for sure the government has planned many ways to tax them. Alcohol and cigarettes are two ways. Fertilizer prices have already risen. Are other taxes coming? We already hear about the rising debts of the rural people. The new farmer's credit card will increase them. Perhaps they have noticed that their leaders are getting richer and richer. I wonder for how much longer they will adore and obey their hero without thinking.
Bangkok Post
