Prin Malakul, corporate affairs director for Thai Asia Pacific Brewery - local bottler of Heineken and Cheers beers - said the National Legislative Assembly (NLA), which will begin reading the draft law today, should look into the absolute power of the regulatory body, the period of sales and the total advertising ban.

"We're concerned with the unlimited power of the regulatory body. It can ban alcohol sales at any place, at any time. This can open channels for bribery," he said, adding that although he had questions on a few issues, he agreed with enactment of the law.

He said called it outrageous that the proposed total advertising ban would cover not only the mass media - particularly television and radio, which reaches minors - but also sponsorships and other channels of communication with consumers.

If passed, Prin said the law could create a bad image for Thailand in the eyes of foreign alcohol companies, including Heineken, which regards Thailand as one of the top 10 markets for its premium-beer product.

When these beers retreat on negative growth potential, Thai Asia Pacific Brewery and other companies may be forced to penetrate the economy-beer segment. Then, when all are involved in a price war to maintain their market shares, alcohol consumption will never fall.

Narong Sahamethapat, deputy director-general of the Public Health Ministry's Disease Control Department, yesterday admitted it would not be easy to have the law passed by the NLA, because of protests from the business sector.

"The NLA should accept the law in principle, but there could be proposals for changes," he said. "We need to fight with data and academic research. We will tell them what Thailand needs, and the NLA will have to choose between the entire population and three or four alcohol companies. I believe the NLA will stand by Thailand."

Narong also agreed the most important parts of the law lie in Articles 25-34, which set the minimum age for drinkers, labelling rules and advertising bans.

Meanwhile, Prin of Thai Asia Pacific Brewery said to ensure that the law was effective in controlling alcohol consumption, Thailand needed to overhaul the excise-tax structure for the beer and local-whisky businesses. At present, the net excise tax collected from beer products and local whisky bears no relevance to net alcohol content.

Based on Excise Department statistics, his company calculated that in the seven years from 1999 to 2005 inclusive, all beer products produced 509,817 hectolitres of net alcohol content, while local whiskies produced 1.735 million hectolitres, or a ratio of 23:77. However, excise taxes from the two categories, based mainly on sales prices, were Bt243 billion and Bt126 billion, respectively, or a ratio of 66:34.

Excise tax has also been raised as a contentious issue by the Singha Group.

Achara Deboonme

The Nation