Revenue up in smoke
ILLEGAL tobacco costs the Federal Government $1.61 billion in lost taxes, a report to be published today will reveal.
The Illicit Tobacco in Australia 2016 report calls for a national strategy, similar to one in place in the UK, to tackle the issue.
The UK introduced a national strategy in 2000 and lost revenue dropped from $5.8 billion to $3.5 billion.
Today’s report, by KPMG, estimates that 13.9 per cent of tobacco consumption in Australia is made up of illicit cigarettes and chop-chop (loose tobacco).
It is estimated that 2.3 million kilograms of illicit tobacco was consumed last year.
Nikitas Theophilopoulos, managing director of tobacco company Philip Morris, said the tobacco industry was urging federal and state authorities to continue their efforts to combat organised crime in tobacco.
The Australian Border Force and its Tobacco Strike Team seized 142 tonnes of illegal tobacco in the last six months of 2016, compared with 82 tonnes in the 12 months before.
Despite the huge amounts of black market products being consumed, the report found that, as a percentage of total consumption, the illicit tobacco market declined by 0.2 points in 2016. The majority of illegal cigarettes arrive from China and South Korea.