Alcohol, Education and Science, Estonia, Legislation, Markets and Companies, Taxation

Education Minister Yevgeny Ossinovski said in a letter sent to the Ministry of Finance that Estonia must implement measures to ensure that the availability of alcoholic beverages among youth decline. One possibility is to raise the price of alcohol but unfortunately, the current proposed amendments do not fully comply with this objective.

"The bill intends to increase equally the excise tax rates on beer, wine, cider, intermediate products and vodka. In the explanatory letter to the bill, the effect of raising the excise tax on final prices of different alcoholic beverages is pointed out. It shows clearly that, although the rate of excise tax is raised equally for different types of alcoholic beverages, the effect on the final price is smaller for weaker alcoholic beverages. This in turn facilitates the purchase of weaker alcoholic beverages by the youth. We find that this solution does not lead to the desired goal of reducing the consumption of alcoholic beverages among young people, "said Social Democrat Ossinovski.

The education minister added that Estonia is among the 25 European countries on the first position regarding the amount of weak alcohol consumed by young people in the age o 12-15 and also the share of young people who have at least once been drunk from weak alcohol is the highest.

The Ministry of Finance is planning to replace the 5% increase of alcohol excise tax a year that was planned for the coming years, with a 15% increase in 2015, and a 10% increase in the next three years.