The latest pan-European price data from Eurostat has found that Ireland and the UK are the most expensive places to buy alcohol and tobacco in the EU, with prices at 174% and 157% of the European average.
Next highest in terms of price are three Nordic EU Member States – Finland (139%), Sweden (127%) and Denmark (123%).
The lowest price levels for alcohol and tobacco were registered in Bulgaria (56% above the average), ahead of Romania (69%) and Hungary (70%).
Eurostat said that the large price variation is 'mainly due to differences in taxation of these products among Member States'.
High Taxes
Commenting on the figures, Patricia Callan of the Drinks Industry Group of Ireland (DIGI) and ABFI, groups that represent the Irish drinks industry, said that the Eurostat data indicates that "Ireland is the most expensive country in the EU for alcohol", noting that the country has the second highest excise tax rate in the EU, after Finland.
"We have the highest excise tax on wine, the second highest on beer and the third highest on spirits," she said. “Our high excise tax is an anti-competitive tax on one of Ireland’s largest employers and fastest-growing industries."
Callan noted that the drinks industry employs 92,000 people around Ireland, and the wider hospitality sector employs almost 210,000 people, or 10 percent of the Irish workforce.
"Through a nationwide network of pubs, hotels, restaurants, off-licences, distilleries, microbreweries, wholesalers and distributors, the drinks industry exports €1.25 billion in goods annually and generates €2.3 billion of revenue for the Exchequer," she said.
“Today’s figures show definitively that Ireland’s price levels vary significantly and that our excise rates are completely out of kilter with our European peers. This is yet another reminder that action is needed now.
"Ultimately, high levels of excise are a tax on businesses and a sector that contributes significantly to the Irish economy in terms of jobs, particularly in rural Ireland. It is also a penal recession-era tax on consumers which needs to be reversed."
© 2018 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Stephen Wynne-Jones. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine
