Denmark to cut tax on chocolate, coffee

As food prices continue to soar in Denmark, the government proposed removing a longstanding tax on chocolate and coffee to give some relief to consumers, officials said last Friday.

- JENNY GROSS

“We have chosen something that will have an immediate effect on Danes, who will immediately feel that they have more money at their disposal,” the country’s deputy prime minister, Troels Lund Poulsen, told Danish broadcaster TV2.

The tax break, which would apply to all products containing cocoa, as well as to licorice, sugary cereals, some cakes, chewing gum and other sweets, would be the largest tax cut on groceries in the country in more than a decade. If it is passed, the price of 17 ounces of coffee beans is expected to fall to 74.5 Danish kroner ($12, or 376 baht), from 79.5 kroner ($12.5).