Every month Armanda from Breda and Kasper from Tilburg travel to Belgium to get tobacco there. And they are far from alone in this. Tobacco is now so expensive in the Netherlands that more than half of smokers in the south and east drive abroad for it. This is evident from research by trade organization VSK Tabak. Nowadays, 25 percent of all cigarette packs are purchased abroad. “They can’t force me to stop. Then I’ll just get it somewhere else.”
31-year-old Kasper van Alphen has been smoking since he was fifteen. He smokes a little more than a pack of rolling tobacco a week and that was starting to add up quite a bit. That’s why he decided a year and a half ago to order his rolling tobacco online in Germany. But this is no longer allowed since last summer due to new regulations.
That is why Kasper now cycles every month from Tilburg to Baarle-Hertog, just across the border in Belgium. “There I pay 13 euros per pack, while in the Netherlands you pay 18 euros for it. With five bumps a month, that’s a big hit.” He doesn’t have a car, so he has to do something for it. “It’s an hour and a half by bike. But I have to, otherwise it won’t be possible to pay.”
48-year-old Armanda Villevoye thinks the same. She smokes fifteen to twenty self-rolled cigarettes a day. “For us it is just as far to Belgium as to the other side of Breda. So those high prices are no reason to stop. Then we’ll just catch up Bels”, she laughs.
“This is my only sin.”
To discourage smoking, the government is raising tobacco prices considerably. In April, the excise duty on cigarettes was increased by 1.22 euros and that on rolling tobacco by 3.05 euros. Next year a pack of rolling tobacco will even cost 24 euros.
“Somehow I can understand it, but then again I can’t,” says Kasper. “You can’t force people to stop smoking.” He tried that once, but he only lasted a month at most each time. “I don’t mind looking a little further, so I’ll keep smoking.”
This also applies to Armanda. “I work in the supermarket and notice that there are customers who try to stop because of the high prices. But the real addicts continue to smoke,” she says. “It is my only sin, I don’t drink alcohol or do drugs. This is my relaxing moment, so I really won’t stop.”