Budapest (MTI) – Hungarian families spend the highest proportion of their income on food in the European Union and healthy food is the luxury of rich people, Szilvia Lengyel, a member of the opposition LMP party’s presidium, said on Sunday.
The Orban government’s measures so far have worsened the conditions of a healthy lifestyle, they could not stop healthy foods taking second stage to imported processed goods, Lengyel told MTI.
Food production and trade is burdened with high tax, especially the 27 percent VAT rate, considered a record high in the European Union. There are also considerable taxes on transport and the supermarket surveillance fee. LMP suggests to reduce the VAT on basic food to 5 percent and to introduce the practice of “green procurements” so that local produce would get preference in public procurements. The government should also support real local markets, where farmers sell healthy local food, “not bananas, kiwi or tangerines”, she said.