Cigarette sales comes to a standstill in Bahrain

Retail shops in Bahrain ran out of cigarettes, thanks to rumours about immediate price hike. Many shops are reportedly taking advantage of the rumours and are selling cigarettes at steeply higher price, DT New has learned. 

Distributors says that no price increase has been authorized by them and they have also stopped the supply of cigarettes due to the confusion regarding the price.

The situation has been created by a recent directive from the customs department, sources says, imposing an extra duty of 100 pc on cigarettes. With this, it is expected that the price of cigarettes could go up by 20 pc to 50 pc of the current selling price. But, rumours are afloat that the prices will go up by 100 pc tomorrow.

One major distributor, who doesn’t want to be named, said that customs department without any prior consultation with the industry or other stake holders announced the hike in the duty. An Arabic newspaper had also reported the decision by the customs department. Industry participants complained that they were not taken into confidence before increasing duty.

Sources say that discussions are going on between Ministry of Finance and customs department regarding the duty hike and a decision will be reached soon.

Even if the authorities decide to increase the duty, it should affect only fresh stocks coming to the Kingdom and not any existing stocks, according to industry observers.