Denmark’s new “fat tax” will not improve public health, according to the Chamber of Commerce. The tax, which is to be based on the amount of fat content found in food, is being rolled out in the New Year in an attempt to tighten the waistbands of the country’s most overweight citizens.
“This tax hits all types of food, also healthy and lean products such as duck and cheese,” said Lotte Engbaek Larsen, food policy manager of the Chamber of Commerce. “And in reality, this tax will only have a very minute effect on our health. According to the Prevention Commission, the tax will increase our life expectancy by 5.5 days after the tax has been in place for 10 years,” Larsen added.
The cost of the average Christmas dinner in Denmark is set to increase dramatically next year, with the price of duck shooting up at least 13.6 percent, the cost of butter by 14 percent and whipped cream by 12 percent, according to calculations from the Tax Ministry.
Henrik Bekker, CEO of Danish food manufacturer Dencon Foods, said “Unfortunately, the duck is not the only one being affected. The price of the pork roast will rise almost as much as that of the duck.”
Bekker added that there were concerns that saturated fats could be replaced by even more unhealthy substitutes. “When producers suddenly have to limit the amount of saturated fat in products, we [take the] risk that new additives will be used to replace the saturated fats in order to manufacture the same flavour. These could include flavour enhancers, sweeteners, phosphate, nitrile salt, etc. No nutritional expert would recommend that from a general health perspective,” he said.
Did anyone really believe that this was passed for any other reason than to suck more money into the national treasury?
If anyone really believes that this had anything to do with improving the health of inhabitants in DK, please contact a mental health professional immediately. You have serious problems with reality perception.
If Danish politicians want to tax food that packs on the blubber, then tax starchy foods and foods containing high fructose corn syrup.
Animal fats and real butter isn’t the problem. Highly processed foods and HFCS is the problem.
Shame and humiliation will go a long way to stigmatizing those foods. This is not hard to do. Connect starchy junk food and HFCS-laced foods with fat ugly people in every conceivable situation. Make it a scandal for sellers to put the stuff on the shelves. Don’t lecture. Just give consumers that feeling of, “Thank God I’m not the fat loser I’m seeing,” while deep down they know who they are.