By MAIMBOLWA MULIKELELA-
THE British American Tobacco (BAT) has said that Government  will lose at least K80 million in revenue in the next four years due to illicit trade of cigarettes.
BAT said the illicit cigarette trade, especially across the informal market was negatively impacting on local cigarette sales and the Government was losing out in terms of revenue.
Currently, the local cigarette industry employs more than 450,000 throughout the supply chain, including 23,000 tobacco growing families.
BAT managing director Clara Mlambo said there was a notable rise in the sale of cigarettes, especially from Zimbabwe across the informal markets.
She said this was impacting negatively on the sales as they cannot compete with smuggled cigarettes which did not pay duty.
Last year, the company’s sales closed at  just under 1.2 billion sticks and currently the sales were at around 1.1 billion sticks.
In an interview in Lusaka, Ms Mlambo said  last year,  BAT  paid K220 million as tax contribution to the Government  and  that the figure would reduce this year because of illicit trade.
In 2013, the sector  produced 40 million killogrammes of tobacco, responsible for $131 million in export earnings.
Ms Mlambo said all legal cigarettes sold in the country carried a tax stamp from the Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) but most tobacco products on the informal markets were sold without the stamps.
“This means that they are not paying tax because they are selling their cigarettes cheaper than our product which is paying tax.
“The Government is losing revenue in taxes and for us as a company, we are losing in terms of sales,” she said.
Cigarettes that do no pay excise duty are smuggled from Zimbabwe, Botswana, Tanzania, Malawi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
“We shall continue to engage ZRA to ensure that the law is enforced, especially at the borders,” Ms Mlambo said.
It was important to have fair competition in order for the industry to grow.