Billions in SA revenue going up in smoke due to illicit cigarettes – study
Research has revealed the South African government has been losing billions of rands because of illegal cigarettes since 2010.
The study was done by the University of Cape Town's Dr Nicole Vellios and Professor Corné van Walbeek.
Van Walbeek says between 2010 to 2022, the government lost R110 billion in excise and VAT revenue.
In 2022 alone, R17.6 billion in tax revenue was lost.
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"In the paper that was published in BMJ Open, we are appealing to government to really take the issue of illicit cigarettes very seriously.
"We have been making this call for a number of years and sadly it seems the problem has not become better but has rather become worse."
BMJ Open, the medical journal the study was published in, is a multi-disciplinary open access journal for peer-reviewed content.
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