site.btaCigarette Tax Revenues Reach 9.5% of All Tax Revenues

June 4 (BTA) - Tax revenues from tobacco products in
Bulgaria reached three billion leva in 2018, or 9.5 per cent of
all tax revenues in the budget, senior researcher Petur Ganev of
 the Institute for Market Economics (IME) told journalists on
Tuesday. Revenues from excise duty totalled 2.5 billion leva,
and nearly 97 per cent of tax revenues in the sector came from
laying taxes on traditional cigarettes.

IME experts estimated that since 2015, there has been a constant
 drop in the illegal consumption of tobacco products, although
this happened because of the increased excise duty since 2016.

The share of illegal cigarettes in Bulgaria is at a record low
of an average of 5 per cent of the total consumption, or 700
million cigarettes yearly. Criminal revenues from illegal
consumption of cigarettes in 2018 totalled between 90 million
leva and 120 million leva, according to the IME. Ganev commented
 that this is much less than the 600 million leva in criminal
revenues in 2010.

The drop in illegal consumption resulted from people's higher
income, according to IME experts. The average price of
cigarettes in Bulgaria is 5 leva, which is 20-25 per cent
cheaper than in member states that recently joined the EU, and
half the average price in the EU. Regardless, cigarettes remain
somewhat expensive for the Bulgarian market. "In 2018, the
available net daily income per head of the population could buy
5.8 packs of cigarettes, while in the EU it could buy 9.3
packs," Ganev noted. RY/TH