With the price of cigarettes set to go up tomorrow, hoarding creates artificial shortage
Qatar announced earlier that beginning tomorrow, taxes and the prices of tobacco products in the country are set to go up.
This announcement has led to many shopkeepers hoarding supplies, eyeing excessive profits, and thus creating an artificial shortage for the product, reported The Peninsula.
With many smokers running around to get as many cigarettes as they can, the demand is quite high, adding to the artificial market.
Earlier, while announcing Qatar’s 2019 budget, the finance ministry had said it would impose ‘selective tax’ on health-damaging goods.
“The selective tax law is designed to impose taxes on certain health-damaging goods, and it’ll be implemented by the beginning of 2019. The law includes a 100% tax on tobacco and its products and energy drinks and a 50% tax on sugary drinks,” it had been announced.
Many grocery stores said they were entirely out of stock of cigarettes and said they had stock of only relatively unpopular brands.
“The disappearance of cigarettes from the shelves didn’t start yesterday as we’ve noticed the shortage for the past five days. Many grocery stores are reluctant to sell popular cigarette brands, and they sell products only to regular customers. Even they aren’t getting more than one packet at a time,” Mohamed Lamin, a smoker, was quoted as saying by The Peninsula.
“What I’ve noticed is they’ve stocks but are waiting for the price hike after tobacco products tax comes into force on January 1 so that they can make more profits,” he added.
“I support this decision because it encourages us to stop smoking. I used to pay QR10 for a pack of Benson & Hedges. Soon, it’ll cost me double that amount. I don’t know if I’ll be able to pay so much every day. I’m thinking of stopping smoking altogether,” he said.
Some shisha joints have already increased the price without notice.
“I used to smoke shisha, and the tobacco I use is now costlier by 30 to 40%. The shops did this in the pretext of the Ministry increasing prices, but we know the law isn’t yet in force,” a shisha smoker told The Peninsula.
Lakshan: they didn't hear a word you said to them then and they're now busy looking for their cigarettes and enjoying each puff even more haha :-)
i wonder what the people i told to dont smoke are doing about this ?
Cigarettes become secrets...hard to find and expensive too
If part of the reason is to stop people from smoking to prevent any unnecessary illness, then just ban it completely. Make cigars or any tobacco products illegal.
Black Marketing - this is happen when the piror information leaked out. All Grocery knows, they have underground complete item. Once price increase they will make it available and will make very good heavy profit.
This is not fair.
Also, to my fellow smokers reading this; if you guys can't find your brand and if the shop has davidoff available, then please do give the brand a try; in qatar the brands are all around the same price but in the european and other western countries, davidoff is a premium brand and you'd pay much more than say for a more regular brand like marlboro; i switched to davidoff classics from marlboro reds about 3 yrs ago and now feel like i wasted the best years of my life and lungs smoking the marlboros when it could've been the davidoffs; they're absolutely top drawer cigarettes and anyone wanting to try them definitely should :-)
Ah, a topic close to my heart haha; shame and woe upon these greedy shop keepers and others like them for whom money and profit is above all else; thankfully, i smoke davidoff - apparently not as popular in qatar as the other brands- and my shop guys are like my adopted brothers and so i haven't had issues; as for the price increase, i feel commodities like fuel/tobacco/alcohol and other essentials aren't price dependent; users will continue to buy them regardless; cigarettes were 4 qr when i started as an 18 yr old swiping them from my dad's pack; they're going to be 20+ now and at no point have the price hikes deterred me from doing what i wanted to do; fuel has gone from 35 dhs to 2qr over the years and i drive no less than before; the human spirit trumps all hurdles i guess haha; we'll just buy less of other things; i personally would get rid of my qtel plan which goes unused anyway; not going to give up my poison of choice because someone thinks it's bad for me; the Qatar govt is acting to deter people from smoking to preserve the health of its citizens and to lessen the burden on health services but the corrupt self serving government in my country just uses commodities and tax to make itself richer and suck the blood from the poor; in both countries, i pay for my own health care and am not a drain on their health care systems; they can do what they want and I'll do as i wish; psycho rant over and I'm going to go smoke one now puff puff puff pffffff!!! Haah
Maybe now they could legalize and regulate the use if Vaping products instead of just banning it because of lack of information.
ciggerettes will be 20-25 per pack which was 8-10 before.
AH! so that;s why all the shops had massive queues and 1 pack per customer!
Price increase wont stop smokers. It is 500 riyal for a pack of 20 in the UK and it didnt stop anyone.
Government should legalise more alternatives (e.g. vape products) as overseas that has led to huge drop in smokers
Very very good news !!
Very very good decision by the government of Qatar to impose significant taxes on health-damaging products !
cant find cigs anywhere, Govt please act against these people
Even you drinkers out there, Buy your Booze today, last day, price increase 100%