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Denmark Enforces The World’s First Fat Tax

  • Spence Cooper
  • October 3, 2011

Denmark has become the first country in the world to impose a fat tax in an alleged effort to limit the population’s consumption of fatty foods. The new tax will be levied on all products that include saturated fats, which can be anything from butter and milk to pizzas and meats.

“It’s the first ever fat tax,” said Mike Rayner, Director of Oxford University’s Health Promotion Research Group, who has long campaigned for taxes on unhealthy foods. “It’s very interesting. We haven’t had any practical examples before. Now we will be able to see the effects for real.”

The tax will be levied at the point of sale from wholesalers to retailers. Aljazeera reports the measure, designed by the outgoing government and announced on Saturday, will add 16 kroner [$2.87] per kg of saturated fats in a product.

Consumers over the past week hoarded butter, meat and milk to avoid the immediate price increase, says Aljazeera. “We have had to stock up with tonnes of butter and margarine in order to be able to supply outlets,” Soeren Joergensen of Arla Distribution told AFP news.

Christian Jensen of an independent local Copenhagen supermarket said: “It has been a chaotic week with a lot of empty shelves. People have been filling their freezers.

The Telegraph reports researchers at Denmark’s Institute for Food and Economic estimate that close to 4 percent of the country’s premature deaths are a result of excess consumption of saturated fats.

A 2007 study by Rayner’s group concluded that a combination of taxes on healthy foods and tax breaks on fruit and vegetables could save 3,200 lives a year in the UK.

Rayner believes the fat tax is the only credible way to combat the obesity problem. “I think we’re going to have them in Britain…because the obesity crisis in the UK is such that we need to take more action.”

Aljazeera notes Denmark’s Confederation of Industries (DI) warned the new costing system was a bureaucratic nightmare for producers and outlets. Computer systems all had to be adjusted, adding additional time to administrative tasks for producers and sellers.

“The way that this has been put together is an administrative nightmare, and I doubt whether it will give better health. It’s more just a tax,” Gitte Hestehave, DI foodstuffs spokeswoman, told AFP, adding that the costs of levying the tax would be passed on to consumers.

Hestehave explained that setting prices on domestically produced or imported goods was complicated, because it required declarations from producers both as to how much saturated fat was in the product itself, and used in its preparation.

“Products that include other products that include saturated fats also have to have new prices worked out. Imported goods require a declaration from the producers abroad on exactly how much saturated fat has been used in production,” Hestehave said.

“As far as we have been able to determine, Denmark is the first country in the world to introduce a fat tax, but we know that other countries are following us closely and have their own plans,” she said.

Jeppe Rosenmejer, an EU legal expert of the Danish Federation of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, said the EU was studying the tax as there may be a competition issue.

While producers in Denmark have to pay the tax at source, for imported goods it is calculated by the distributor.

“This can mean that imported goods will be cheaper than domestically produced items,” said Jeppe Rosenmejer, an EU legal expert of the Danish Federation of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises.

A Danish producer will have to pay the tax on all of the saturated fat used, including for example what a product is fried in, he said. An importer may only be paying according to what is actually in the finished product.

Food Police

Denmark Enforces The World’s First Fat TaxIt’s not enough that the Danish right-wing government levying the tax has decided to punish everyone, including those with normal body weight for the perceived transgressions of less than 10 percent of Danes who are considered clinically obese. Denmark has now decreed that perfectly healthy foods are unhealthy.

There is nothing inherently unhealthy about eating small portions of milk, butter and meat as part of a balanced diet that also includes fruits and vegetables.

People around the world have had enough of governments imposing public policies (bank bailouts, austerity measures) unpopular with the majority of their citizens. My guess is the Danes will force their leaders to repeal this fat tax within six months.

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