Author: Taco Tuinstra

Hong Kong Urged to Raise Taxes

Photo: IB Photography
The Hong Kong Council on Smoking and Health (COSH) has called on the city’s government to increase the tobacco tax by at least three quarters in the 2024-2025 budget, reports the South China Morning Post.
Such a raise would bring the levy in line with the World Health Organization’s recommendation for taxes to account for 75 percent or more of cigarettes’ retail price. The proposed tax hike will push up the cigarette retail price to about HKD115 ($14.70) per pack, a potential tipping point for many smokers to consider cessation.
The move will also help Hong Kong achieve its goal of reducing smoking prevalence to 7.8 percent by 2025, according to the COSH. The smoking prevalence in Hong Kong was 9.5 percent in 2021.
COSH also advocates for an automatic tax increase mechanism for future annual tax hikes, adjusted to counteract the effects of inflation and income growth, and avoid the tax’s proportion in the overall retail price of cigarettes being decreased by industry price hikes.
According to the COSH, raising the tobacco tax requires the least implementation costs and enforcement resources, and the shortest time for legislation and implementation, while delivering the quickest and most significant results.
February 18, 2024
KT&G Finalizes Second CEO Shortlist

Photo: brizmaker
KT&G’s CEO candidate recommendation committee finalized the selection of candidates to be included in the second shortlist for the next CEO position. The candidates are Chul-ho Her (CEO of Korea Ginseng Corp.), Gye-hyun Kwon (former vice president of Samsung Electronics), Kyung-man Bang (senior vice president of KT&G) and Seok-joo Lee (former CEO of AK Holdings).
In selecting the candidates, the committee assessed to what extent the qualifications and competencies of the eight candidates on the first shortlist align with the five key competency criteria required for a CEO, which include management expertise, global expertise, strategical thinking skills, stakeholder communications and universal morality and ethical awareness.
The committee plans to conduct face-to-face interviews with each candidate on the second shortlist and name the final candidate following the committee resolution next week. The CEO will be officially appointed at the annual general meeting of shareholders in late March.
In a press note announcing the second shortlist, KT&G reiterated its commitment to fair and transparent CEO selection process. In late 2023, shareholder Flashlight Capital Partners urged KT&G to select its next CEO in a more transparent manner.
“The CEO candidate recommendation committee is fully committed to ensuring the transparency, fairness and objectivity throughout the candidate assessment process, adhering to the principle of maximizing the interests of all shareholders and the future value of the company,” said Myung-chul Kim, chairman of the KT&G CEO candidate recommendation committee.
“After conducting in-depth interviews with each candidate, we will determine and announce the most suitable candidate for the next CEO position, possessing the leadership qualities necessary to drive KT&G to greater heights of a global leading company.”
February 16, 2024
Court Urged to Revive Liquid Application

Photo: evgeniykleymenov
SWT Global Supply, a maker of menthol-flavored e-cigarette liquids, has urged the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to revive its rejected application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to continue selling its products, arguing that the FDA had not given the company fair notice of what would be required for approval, reports Reuters.
This latest appeal is one of many similar cases by e-cigarette companies following the FDA’s rule deeming e-cigarette products be subject to the same law as cigarettes and the FDA’s denial of millions of applications by manufacturers to sell their products. Federal appeals courts are split as to whether the FDA acted fairly.
SWT lawyer Jerad Najvar told a three-judge panel that SWT’s applications were denied because the company failed to present a controlled trial or study showing that menthol liquids can help adult smokers quit smoking compared to tobacco-flavored liquids. According to Najvar, the FDA’s guidance did not make it clear that such a study would be required.
“A client like mine doesn’t have a lot of arrows in its quiver when it’s trying to fight a decision by a federal agency,” said Navjar, referring to SWT being a small company with limited resources.
Comparing a product’s effectiveness to tobacco-flavored products is “a natural part of the risk benefit analysis,” according to Catherine Padhi, a lawyer for the FDA. She noted that SWT was free to submit additional information to support its application.
In 2021, the FDA denied SWT’s applications for liquids in various nonmenthol flavors, and in 2023, the FDA denied applications for menthol flavors. The nonmenthol denials are part of a separate, still-pending appeal in the 5th Circuit.
Most other appeals courts have sided with the FDA in similar cases.
February 16, 2024
Califf Pushing U.S. Menthol Ban: Politico

Photo: FDA
U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Robert Califf has privately asked friends and public health experts to lobby the White House to ban menthol cigarettes, according to Politico. Califf reportedly fears that President Joe Biden might abandon the policy to avoid backlash from Black voters before the upcoming elections. The minority communities are core to Biden’s voter base.
“Fundamentally, these bold actions are about saving hundreds of thousands of lives each year,” Califf said in 2022, when the FDA first proposed the ban. “Prohibiting menthol in cigarettes would mean over 18.5 million menthol cigarette smokers ages 12 and older in the United States would have a better shot at quitting.”
In October 2023, the FDA finalized its menthol ban policy and submitted it for approval. However, the White House has not given it the go ahead due to pushback from a handful of influential Black industry allies who warn the ban would fuel an underground market, worsen over policing in minority communities and have a negative effect on Biden’s standing among Black voters.
Advocates of the ban fear that the delay means politics will override the urgency of the ban and that Biden will delay implementation until after the November presidential election.
“We’re now in a political season, and it’s only going to get tougher for them to do it,” said Yolonda Richardson, CEO of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. “All the delays are to the benefit of the tobacco industry. That’s just more time they have to keep them on the street, that much more time to addict kids.”
Recently, Califf has been raising the issue internally in addition to soliciting outside help. He has enlisted senior White House officials and Health and Human Services officials to help advocate for the ban. Califf has also personally pressed senior Biden aides on the decision.
“Everybody’s done what they could do,” said a senior administration official, who was granted anonymity to discuss private conversations. The White House declined to comment, citing a policy against discussing rules before they’re finalized.
“The FDA remains committed to issuing the tobacco product standards for menthol in cigarettes and characterizing flavors in cigars as exponentially as possible, said Michael Felberbaum, FDA spokesperson.
“In the last year of this administration, so many things happen with a lot of pressure to get things finished, and sometimes political pressure comes into play,” said Califf, who has also sought to restrict flavored cigars and wants to mandate lower nicotine levels in all cigarettes and other tobacco products. “A lot of considerations have to be navigated.”
The FDA had initially hoped to finalize the menthol ban before the end of 2023. Now, the FDA has set a new deadline of March for a final rule.
February 16, 2024
Pyxus Recognized as Environmental Leader

Image: blacksalmon
Pyxus International has been recognized as a leader in climate change transparency and performance by the environmental nonprofit CDP. CDP ranked Pyxus among the top tier of responding companies in the climate change category, earning the business “Leadership” status, the highest level of achievement.
“Achieving CDP’s Leadership status is a testament to our global teams’ hard work, ingenuity and commitment to growing a better world,” said Pyxus President and CEO Pieter Sikkel in a statement. “We are pleased that our unified approach to sustainable action and core belief in transparency has earned us this coveted recognition, and as we move forward in our net-zero journey, it will serve as a reminder that our efforts, large and small, make an impact.”
Pyxus’ A- score for its actions to mitigate climate change ranked higher than the industry, North America and global averages of B, C and C, respectively, and reflects the company’s 11 percent year-over-year reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as reported in its FY2023 Sustainability Report and its CDP disclosure. Additionally, the company earned a B score in both the water security and forestry categories, which indicates it has addressed the environmental impacts of the business and has implemented good environmental management practices specific to water and forestry.
Pyxus’ scores reflect data compiled from its family of companies and brands, and were determined by CDP-accredited scoring partners on a scale ranging from A to D- and then measured against more than 21,000 entities as part of the 2023 process.
Pyxus began reporting its greenhouse gas emissions to CDP in 2009, its water data in 2014 and its forestry data in 2020.
February 16, 2024
Anti-Illicit Trade Convention Concludes

Photo: Ivan Semenovych
The Third session of the Meeting of the Parties (MOP3) to the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products concluded Feb. 15 with new commitments to combat the black market.
“Our meeting this week took important decisions on tobacco tracking-and-tracing systems and approved a road map to conduct evidence-based research on illicit trade,” said Adriana Blanco Marquizo, who as head of the Secretariat of WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control also oversees the Protocol.
“We also agreed on improvements for the reporting system our Parties use, which will strengthen the quality of data on implementation of the Protocol that can help guide future tobacco control efforts,” she said in a statement.
The MOP is the governing body of the Protocol, which is an international treaty that entered into force in 2018 and aims to eliminate illicit trade in tobacco products through a package of measures to be taken by countries acting in cooperation with one another.
“It is a global solution to a global problem,” said Blanco Marquizo.
Illicit trade accounts for about 11 percent of total global tobacco trade, and its elimination could increase global tax revenues by an estimated $47.4 billion annually.
Representatives from 56 Parties to the Protocol and 27 non-Party States gathered in Panama City, Feb.12-14 to tackle a range of issues from progress on implementation of the treaty to sustainable financing for tobacco control.
MOP3 also adopted the Panama Declaration that calls on national governments to be alert for what it described industry campaign to undermine efforts to eliminate illicit trade in tobacco products.
The Panama Declaration also emphasized the need for effective action to prevent and combat illicit trade in tobacco products, which requires a comprehensive international approach to—and close cooperation on—all aspects of illicit trade in tobacco, tobacco products and tobacco manufacturing equipment.
Contradicting the observations of some tobacco grower representatives and consumer activists, the WHO said MOP3 was open to the media.
February 16, 2024
A Misguided Crusade

Photo: Swedish Match
The campaigns against lower risk nicotine products serve political goals at the expense of public health.
By Catharine Dockery
Cigarette smoking remains the leading cause of preventable death in the United States and many other countries. Shouldn’t our leaders do everything they can to prevent deaths and reduce harm?
Unfortunately, U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer and the Food and Drug Administration have missed a profound public health opportunity by not encouraging reduced-harm nicotine products such as Zyn. Instead, they are targeting these lifesaving products and proposing wide-reaching bans.
While youth usage of nicotine is a deeply concerning issue, product prohibitions are an ineffective distraction from the failure of the FDA to act proactively to protect Americans. Flavored recreational nicotine options are essential tools to present combustible cigarette smokers with less harmful options they enjoy. Public health officials need to stop scapegoating harm reduction products targeted to adult smokers and instead focus on addressing youth use.
Other public health organizations, such as the U.K. National Health Service (NHS), have recognized the potential of harm reduction products in saving lives and promoted recreational nicotine options. For example, their “swap to stop” program has offered new noncombustible tobacco products to smokers in an effort to move them to lower risk alternatives. The NHS website offers that “[i]n recent years, e-cigarettes have become a very popular stop-smoking aid in the U.K. Also known as vapes or e-cigs, they’re far less harmful than cigarettes and can help you quit smoking for good.”
In the United States, by contrast, government officials and public health agencies are spurning a significant opportunity in reduced-harm nicotine products. In 2023, nearly half a million adults died in the United States from the effects of cigarettes.
Research demonstrates that flavored nicotine products provide a less harmful option for adult cigarette smokers who are trying to find a substitute for their habit.
A 2021 study found that among U.S. adults who smoke, despite only 29 percent being aware of nicotine pouches, nearly 17 percent expressed interest in trying the products in the coming six months.
To the extent adult smokers are able to substitute pouches for cigarettes, it’s absolutely appropriate to view these products as lower harm options on a continuum of risk.
Some research indicates that e-cigarettes can be more effective than nicotine-replacement therapy products like gums and lozenges at helping smokers quit, showing the role of these products in the public health fight against tobacco-related harm.
Policymakers’ efforts to restrict harm reduction products are often done under the guise of protecting children. But in no other industry do we consider product bans a reasonable control to address underage use. It would be unheard of to ban alcohol to prevent underage drinking.
Product bans have been largely unsuccessful in addressing youth vaping, a failure made clear by the fact that the top 2 youth e-cigarette brands of 2023 are illegal (Elf Bar and Esco Bar, used by 57 percent and 22 percent of youth surveyed, respectively). The FDA has completely failed to enforce bans on these illegal brands with flavors and designs designed specifically to appeal to underage users. The numbers are clear—10 percent of middle school and high school students use tobacco products, and the vast majority of those (7.7 percent) use e-cigarettes.
We also need to engage with the facts of youth nicotine abuse. E-cigarettes are far and away the main method of consumption among underage users, used by 7.7 percent of students in 2023 relative to the 1.5 percent using nicotine pouches. Significantly more effort is needed to crack down on illegal sales, particularly online sales, of these products. If product bans can’t solve youth usage issues, can we really justify the public health costs of denying vital options to smokers?
On this issue, we’re repeatedly offered a false choice between youth nicotine abuse and robust options for adult smokers. This is a purely political characterization of the problem. There are a multitude of actions that can be taken to protect youth from the dangers of nicotine. Significantly stronger enforcement is needed at retailers, both for age verification and to prevent the sale of illegal products.
A strong FDA focused on hands-on enforcement is needed to ensure that nicotine companies operate responsibly and avoid appealing to underage consumers. We also need stronger import controls on these products, with illegal imports often coming from unfriendly nations. These common-sense actions can protect youth without dramatic costs to adult smokers.
The public health conversation around nicotine has been unfortunately politicized, and we’ve lost sight of the most important goal: saving lives. Product bans and public policies targeting reduced-harm products would have material impacts on the options available to adult smokers while doing little to address the underlying factors enabling youth nicotine use in this country. Targeting some of the lowest risk tobacco products available is an unacceptable government overreach, serving political rather than public health goals.

Catharine Dockery is the founder and general partner of Vice Ventures, a private equity firm that invests in good companies operating in superficially “bad” industries.

Vice Ventures is the most active private equity nicotine investor in the U.S. The company approaches the sector through a harm reduction lens.

Prior to founding Vice Ventures, Dockery was a member of Walmart’s mergers and acquisitions team. She also has experience in equity trading and high-yield research.

Through her work on Vice Ventures, Dockery has been recognized in various media including in 2020 as a headline member of the Forbes 30 Under 30, an index that recognizes notable young people in various industries.

Dockery graduated from The Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University, where she concentrated in the intersection of neuroscience and finance. She grew up in New York and loves a slightly dirty martini with olives on the side.

February 14, 2024
Gudang Garam to Build Toll Road

Photo: Bunda
Gudang Garam plans to construct a toll road in East Java, reports The Jakarta Globe
In a public filing on Tuesday, 13 Feb 2024, the company said it had recently established a subsidiary, Surya Sapta Agung Tol, to construct a toll road connecting Kediri and Tulungagung, with an initial capital of IDR3.5 trillion ($223.6 million).
Gudang Garam owns 99.9 of Surya Sapta, with Suryaduta Investama owning the remaining 0.1 percent. Suryaduta is a majority shareholder in Gudang Garam, controlling a 69.29 percent stake in the cigarette company.
Both Gudang Garam and Surya Sapta are based in Kediri, approximately 150 kilometers west of Surabaya.
The toll road is Gudang Garam’s second infrastructure project, following the recent completion of a small airport in Kediri. Although Dhoho Kediri Airport opened to the public earlier this month, it is not yet fully operational.
February 14, 2024
‘Hookah Suppliers Skipping Warnings”

Photo: Lightfield Studios
A new study from the Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) shows that only half of hookah packages assessed included required nicotine warnings two years after a national requirement to do so took effect in the United States.
In August 2018, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration mandated that all hookah manufacturers include a nicotine warning on their packaging to communicate the harms of the tobacco in their products.
Published in the journal JAMA Network Open, the study found that only three brands out of 33 brands assessed were 100 percent compliant with all warning label requirements, which mandated a range of placement and formatting elements.
The study is the first to examine this compliance with warning requirements on hookah packaging in the country.
Hookah tobacco smoke contains many of the same harmful components found in cigarette smoke, including nicotine, tar, heavy metals and carbon monoxide. But people who smoke hookah may inhale as much as 70 times more tar and 11 times more carbon monoxide from water pipes than from cigarettes, due in part to the length of hookah smoking sessions, which typically last at least one hour. These toxic exposures can increase hookah smokers’ risk of developing cancers, heart disease, respiratory issues, and blood pressure complications, according to the FDA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We know that warnings are an effective way to communicate to people the harms associated with smoking all types of tobacco, but to be effective, they must exist to begin with,” says study lead and corresponding author Jennifer Ross, associate professor of health law, policy and management at BUSPH, in a statement. “We hope this study will bring attention to the low levels of compliance among hookah manufacturers so that additional action can be taken to increase compliance. We also hope that these findings will lead to efforts to further increase the impact of warnings for hookah, such as implementing more warnings and in more locations to increase people’s exposure to the warning labels.”
“Young people often have misperceptions about the dangers of smoking tobacco in a hookah, such as thinking that the water in the waterpipe ‘purifies’ the tobacco, which is not true,” Ross says.
For the study, Ross and colleagues from Wake Forest University School of Medicine and East Carolina University identified all hookah brands available for online purchase in 2020—a total of 66. They narrowed their analysis to 33 brands, including a total of 181 packages, based on a combination of highest product prevalence and random selection.
The team found that 97, or about half, of the observed packages had the required nicotine warning statement. Of the 33 brands in the sample, 10 of them included no nicotine warnings on their packages at all. Among the packages with nicotine warnings, nearly one-third did not display the warnings in the area of the packaging that the FDA required (on the front, or on the top and back). Similarly, nearly one-third of hookah packages with the warnings did not adhere to the FDA’s style and formatting requirements for the labels.
“This is the first study to assess compliance with the federal law on hookah warnings, and our results show that many brands are not in compliance,” says study senior author Erin Sutfin, professor of social sciences and health policy at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. “The ultimate goal of warnings is to provide information about health harms of product use directly to consumers so they can make informed decisions. We hope these findings are useful to the FDA and will promote enforcement action against noncompliant companies.”
February 14, 2024
Replica 2.0 Team to Meet in Catania

Photo: CoEHAR
The Center of Excellence for the Acceleration of Harm Reduction (CoEHAR) will hold the Annual International Meeting for its Replica 2.0 project in Catania, Italy, March 25–29.
The Replica project is one of CoEHAR’s most successful projects, according to the organization. In the last couple of years, the research team replicated and validated the results from well-known international studies in the field of tobacco harm reduction.
The project benefits from its collaboration with an international network of independent laboratories all around the world, which includes the Universitas Padjadjaran in Indonesia, the Institute of Research and Development Nosmoke in Greece, the Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of Kragujevac in Serbia, the Sultan Qaboos University in Oman, the Temple University-SHRO in the United States and Kazan Federal University, Russia.
During the event, the Replica team will discuss lessons learned, harmonize standard operation procedures for the project and continue the laboratory training emphasizing critical steps for harmonization.
On March 29, CoEHAR will host the ceremony for its Talent Research Award.
Tobacco Reporter profiled CoEHAR in its January 2024 print edition and online (see, “Reviewing their Peers”).
February 14, 2024