The Finance Ministry has vowed to enhance the competitiveness of Thai community liquor on a global scale.
According to Deputy Finance Minister Julapun Amornvivat, after the Excise Department reduced the community liquor tax from 10% to 0% of the value, community liquor has grown significantly, with about 2,000 producers nationwide.
The Finance Ministry intends to enhance the competitiveness of community liquor, he said.
Mr Julapun said alcohol products are banned from advertising, but large liquor companies can engage in covert advertising. Community liquor businesses lack the capacity to compete with larger companies, he said.
If alcohol businesses are allowed to advertise, a suitable balance must be struck to avoid negative social impacts, along with appropriate regulations to prevent incidents such as the recent illegal liquor cluster in Min Buri, where people died from consuming illegal liquor containing methanol, Mr Julapun said.
He said in other countries, there are efforts to promote community production of quality liquor. For example, in Japan there are more than 60,000 liquor brands, and in Germany the government oversees the quality and quantity of local liquor to ensure competitiveness and contribution to economic growth.
Ekniti Nitithanprapas, director-general of the Excise Department, said in the first 11 months of the current fiscal year, the department collected 1.26 billion baht in taxes from community liquor, up 5% year-on-year.
Although the department eliminated the excise tax on the value of community liquor, the tax on the quantity remains unchanged. For instance, fermented liquors like krachae, sato and other local fermented liquors using rice with alcohol content not exceeding 7 degrees are still taxed at a rate of 0% based on value and 150 baht per litre of pure alcohol content.
For the first 11 months of fiscal 2024, the Excise Department collected 482 billion baht in taxes, 10.6% higher than the same period last year. The department expects to meet its target of 520 billion baht for the year.
The tax with the highest growth rate is on batteries, which increased 16% year-on-year, driven by greater use of clean energy, such as batteries for solar cells and electric vehicles.
According to Mr Ekniti, the department is striving to support environmentally friendly community liquor production that reduces waste to 0%.
For example, the agency supports the use of distilled dry yeast as pig feed and the use of pig manure to produce biofuel for energy in the liquor production process.
