UK - Luxury items Tax them!

Throwaway razors and nappies should be taxed as luxuries, says Defra. Disposable razors and nappies could be taxed as luxury goods in order to cut the amount of waste going to landfill, a Government-funded report to ministers has suggested.

In the same way as taxes were applied to discourage the purchase of cigarettes and alcohol, they should apply to disposable goods that cannot be reused or recycled in order to prevent people from buying them as cheap and convenient alternatives to reusable items, the report said. Taxes would also encourage manufacturers to focus on the development of more durable products. If disposable razors were taxed at the same rate as cigarettes – about 80% of the price goes to the Treasury – a single Gillette Mach 3 would leap from £1 to £5.

The report, commissioned from Eunomia Research & Consulting by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), says: "Some products considered 'luxury', such as alcohol and tobacco, have heavy duties on them. If disposable products were categorised in a similar way, they could be subjected to similar duties." The report also advocates new taxes on household rubbish, claiming they could halve the amount of waste each person throws away from 363 Kg to 181 kg a year.

It also suggests imposing taxes on disposable items such as paper plates and nappies. Some three billion disposable nappies are thrown away every year in the UK, accounting for 4% of all household waste.

Matthew Sinclair, policy analyst for the TaxPayers' Alliance, told the Sunday Express: "Politicians must stop using environmental concerns as a smokescreen for raising taxes."
The TaxPayers' Alliance recently released a report claiming that families were paying an average of £783 a year in environmental taxes.

From The Independent

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World- Half of food wasted - uneaten

Tremendous quantities of food are discarded in processing, transport, supermarkets and people's kitchens. This wasted food is also wasted water. In the US, for instance, as much as 30% of food, worth some USD 48.3 billion, is thrown away. That's like leaving the tap running and pouring 40 trillion litres of water into the garbage can - enough water to meet the household needs of 500 million people. Through international trade, savings in one country might benefit communities in other parts of the world.

More than enough food is produced to feed a healthy global population. Distribution and access to food is a problem - many are hungry, while at the same time many over-eat. The Report highlights an often overlooked problem: we are providing food to take care of not only our necessary consumption but also our wasteful habits.
"As much as half of the water used to grow food globally may be lost or wasted," says Dr. Charlotte de Fraiture, Researcher at IWMI. "Curbing these losses and improving water productivity provides win-win opportunities for farmers, business, ecosystems, and the global hungry. An effective water-saving strategy requires that minimising food wastage is firmly placed on the political agenda." Food production is constrained by the availability of water and land resources.

An estimated 1.2 billion people already live in areas where there is not enough water to meet demand. And with rising demand for water-intensive agricultural products, such as beef and bioenergy, pressure mounts. According to the Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture 2007, these trends will lead to crises in many places, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. "Unless we change our practices, water will be a key constraint to food production in the future," said Dr. Pasquale Steduto of FAO.

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