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Category: Around the Industry

  • Kenya: Illicit Cigarettes Jump to 37% of the Market 

    Kenya: Illicit Cigarettes Jump to 37% of the Market 

    Kenya is losing more than Sh9 billion ($69 million) annually in potential revenue (taxes and levies) to the illicit cigarette trade, a new report now indicates, with almost all of these products being smuggled into the country. The newly released findings from a study conducted by international research company Kantar indicate that the illicit cigarette trade in Kenya has soared to a record high, with more than one in three cigarettes sold in the market not paying taxes.

    BAT Kenya is calling for urgent action by the authorities to tackle and mitigate the profound implications of illicit trade in cigarettes, and said “this alarming situation calls for drastic, multipronged action to seal the loopholes and protect legitimate business in Kenya.”

    “This alarming rise in illegal cigarette trade is not only depriving the Kenyan government of vital revenue needed for the country’s economic stability, but is also undermining the security and livelihoods of thousands of Kenyans in our value chain,” BAT Kenya managing director Crispin Achola said. “The illicit trade in cigarettes is not only an economic issue, it is a matter of national security and public interest.”

    Last year, the value of smuggled and counterfeit goods seized at Kenya’s entry points, reached Sh243. 5 million ($1.9 million), according to Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), up from Sh200 million ($1.5 million) the previous year. Reports also suggest illicit cigarettes jumped from occupying 27% of the market to 37% in just one year.  

  • Op-Ed: SHORT-SIGHTED AND INEFFECTIVE – VAPE BANS ARE NOT THE ANSWER

    Op-Ed: SHORT-SIGHTED AND INEFFECTIVE – VAPE BANS ARE NOT THE ANSWER

    By Dato Adzwan Abdul Manas, President, Malaysia Retail Electronic Cigarette Association (MRECA)

    Across Malaysia, we’re witnessing a growing wave of state-led attempts to ban vape products, with Perlis, Terengganu, and Kedah – all governed by opposition parties – announcing prohibitions, with Penang, Selangor and Negeri Sembilan reportedly considering the same.

    Publicly, leaders and MPs are now echoing calls for a nationwide ban, citing concerns over vape products laced with drugs and growing concern over youth vaping.

    Let us be clear: these concerns are real, but the proposed solutions are dangerously flawed.

    The reason we are seeing issues like underage use and contaminated products is not because of the legal vape industry. It is because irresponsible, illegal retailers and criminal syndicates continue to operate without fear of consequences. These bad actors have no regard for regulations, age restrictions, or product safety. They are the ones supplying unregistered products, selling to minors, and introducing dangerous substances into the supply chain.

    Banning vape will not stop these criminals. It will only penalise legitimate, regulated businesses, whilst empowering the black market.

    The leaders now calling for a ban are reacting to the harm caused by illegal and unregulated players. But instead of focusing efforts on enforcement to eliminate these elements, they propose a blanket ban that would wipe out responsible retailers, many of whom are registered and comply with all current regulations.

    If we take the easy way out and ban vape outright, we risk creating an entirely unregulated underground market. Everything will be black market. No age checks, no quality control, no accountability. This is the worst possible outcome for public health.

    We must remember that the Control of Smoking Products for Public Health Act 2024 (Act 852), has now been introduced. This is the very tool meant to bring vape into a regulated space, to ensure product safety, protect youth, and allow only legal players to operate. Why are we not concentrating our energy on implementing this law effectively, with robust enforcement to weed out the bad actors?

    According to Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) Malaysia 2023 survey by the Institute for Public Health under the Ministry of Health, the majority of vape users are aged 15 to 24 years. These numbers did not emerge under a regulated environment. They grew due the absence of a clear regulatory framework. This proves that prohibition does not work. What works is regulations, oversight, and the political will to enforce the law.

    MRECA fully supports regulations. We support clear rules that keep products out of the hands of minors and ensure safety for adult consumers. But we cannot support a system where the actions of criminal syndicates are used to justify blanket bans that harm legitimate businesses.

    With Act 852 already in place, the focus must be on moving forward: implementing it with urgency, investing in enforcement, and strengthening the regulatory framework so that only responsible, compliant players remain in the market.

    Banning regulated products is not a solution, it is an abdication of responsibility that hands the market over to criminals. If we want to protect public health and consumer safety, we must stay the course, enforce the law decisively, and commit to building a legal, transparent vape industry that operates within clear and accountable boundaries.

  • U.S. Faces Vape Shortage as Tariffs Hit, Seizures Increase

    U.S. Faces Vape Shortage as Tariffs Hit, Seizures Increase

    Popular vape brands like Geek Bar may get more expensive in the U.S.—if you can find them at all, Reuters reports. Shipments of vapes from China to the U.S. ground to a near halt in May from a year ago, official data shows, hit by U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and a crackdown on unauthorized e-cigarettes in the world’s biggest market for smoking alternatives.

    That includes Geek Bar, which is not authorized to sell in the U.S. but has been widely available due to porous import controls. Geek Bar was by far the most popular unauthorized vape brand in the U.S. last year, accounting for around a quarter of sales tracked by market research company Circana in 2024 despite lacking a license to sell from the FDA.

    One retailer, who asked not to be named because their business sells unauthorized vapes, told Reuters that one of the store’s vape suppliers normally receives 100 boxes of Geek Bar vapes per week, but is now getting just 10. Another supplier imposed unprecedented purchase limits of five boxes.

    “There were a lot of supply chain issues” during COVID-19, the person said. “But I’ve never seen this.”

    Trump’s decision to impose steep tariffs on China, now at 30% after peaking at 145% in April, as well as blockbuster seizures of unauthorized vapes, have constrained the supply of Chinese-owned vape brands and Geek Bar in particular, according to five industry sources and notices from U.S. Geek Bar wholesalers reviewed by Reuters. In May 2025, the FDA recorded just 71 shipments of products labelled as e-cigarettes or vapes from China, compared with nearly 1,200 over the same period last year.

    To mitigate tariffs, illicit vape producers can mislabel or undervalue their shipments or spoof their origin entirely to make it look like they came from a lower-tariff country like Indonesia, Vietnam or Mexico, said Luis Pinto, a spokesperson for British American Tobacco. Vapes from China are often smuggled into the U.S. disguised as other items entirely, such as shoes or toys, to evade officials hunting for unauthorized vapes at the border, according to public statements from the FDA and Customs and Border Protection.

    The growth of Geek Bar and other unregulated vape brands has eaten into the market share of cigarette companies like Altria and BAT, which estimates unauthorized e-cigarettes accounted for some 70% of all U.S. vape sales last year.

  • Study: Chinese Going Online to Bypass Flavor Ban 

    Study: Chinese Going Online to Bypass Flavor Ban 

    More than 90% of stores selling e-cigarettes in two major Chinese cities provided WeChat accounts or QR codes for quick delivery services, allowing consumers to bypass a nationwide ban on online sales that took effect in May 2022, a new study has found. Research conducted by the Health Communication Institute of Fudan University in Shanghai, compared e-cigarette stores in Shanghai and Chengdu, Sichuan province, before and after the implementation of the regulations.  

    In the first observation period in 2021, about 25% of stores offered a WeChat account and 17% provided a QR code for delivery services. These figures jumped to 90% and 91%, respectively, in the second observation period (December 2023 to March 2024), indicating a significant shift of customers from in-person to online purchases.

    The regulations explicitly prohibit the sale of flavored e-cigarettes other than tobacco flavor and the sale of e-cigarette products to minors. They also ban the use of vending machines for such products and require warning labels on packaging. However, the study revealed that one-third of the surveyed stores continued to sell flavored e-cigarette cartridges, and only 83% had implemented age restrictions on sales.

  • PCA Survey Sees Improvement for Manufacturers

    PCA Survey Sees Improvement for Manufacturers

    The Premium Cigar Association released the results of its First Quarter 2025 survey this week, asking 112 retailers and 24 manufacturers for their opinion on several topics. In comparing 2024 to 2023, 51% of the retailers said they did better, 29% the same, and 20% did worse. For manufacturers, 67% did better, 17% the same, and 17% worse.

    In an open-ended question asking what retailers would like to communicate to manufacturers to help sell product, the nine most common answers were listed, including controlling moderate price increases and shipping, limiting high-end offerings and creating more “economy cigars,” better education/communication, fixing supply issues, and stopping the “what’s new” mentality and focusing on core lines.

    See the entire survey here.

  • CASAA to Cease Operations in August

    CASAA to Cease Operations in August

    The Consumer Advocates for Smoke Free Alternatives Association (CASAA) will cease operations, ending its legislative advocacy work by the end of August. Alex Clark, the group’s executive director, made the announcement to members via email. The group has been advocating for tobacco harm reduction (THR) since 2009.

    “CASAA has organized consumer opposition to restrictive laws, commented on policy issues, sent representatives to speak at hearings and public gatherings, and collected thousands of testimonials from consumers who used reduced-harm nicotine products,” wrote Jim McDonald, an industry reporter and member of CASAA board. “Due at least in part to CASAA-organized consumer opposition to proposed state and local laws, hundreds of potentially damaging bills and ordinances have been stopped across the country since 2009.” 

    McDonald pointed to a lack of funding, needed to pay for legislative-tracking software and target communications to members, as the reason for closing the non-profit organization.

  • Despite Increase, Pakistan Faces Cigarette Tax Revenue Shortfall

    Despite Increase, Pakistan Faces Cigarette Tax Revenue Shortfall

    Contrary to recent optimistic projections, Pakistan’s Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) tax collection from documented cigarette industry is expected to fall significantly from last year, highlighting growing challenges in the sector amid rising smuggling and regulatory inefficiencies.

    For the 2024-25 fiscal year, the government budgeted revenue collected from the cigarette industry to reach PKR 285 billion ($998 million). However, industry insiders and financial analysts say that figure is not grounded in factual analysis, and PKR 250 billion ($875 million) is more realistic.

    According to Business Recorder, a major factor behind the revenue shortfall is the exorbitant imposition of Adjustable Federal Excise Duty (FED) on acetate tow, a key raw material used in cigarette manufacturing. The industry recommended an adjustable FED rate of PKR 4,000 per kg, which was intended to increase the cost of doing business for the illicit players and was supposed to be adjusted against the final tax liability improving documentation and reconciliation. However, the government imposed a FED rate of PKR 44,000 per kg, a sharp rise that has inadvertently made smuggling far more lucrative and has led to a dramatic increase in illicit activity.  

  • Companies Partner to Unite Cannabis Cultivation Process

    Companies Partner to Unite Cannabis Cultivation Process

    Cannatrol, a provider of precision-controlled drying and curing technology, announced a strategic alliance with Rhythm Cultivation Solutions & Services, a fertigation and environmental controls company. Through the partnership, data collected throughout the cultivation and post-harvest processes will provide commercial cannabis cultivators new insights into their operations and efficiency.

    “At the core of this partnership is a shared belief in making growers’ lives easier by connecting the dots across the cultivation journey,” said David Sandelman, co-founder and inventor of the Cannatrol system. “By joining forces with Rhythm, we’re enabling our customers to work smarter, not harder.”

    The two companies will integrate Cannatrol’s proprietary operating data into Rhythm’s interfact, delivering a seamless, data-rich experience for commercial cannabis cultivators. This collaboration marks a pivotal step toward unifying the entire cultivation process—from growth to post-harvest—by providing operators with a complete, end-to-end view of their facility data in one intuitive platform.

  • Al Fakher Launches MINI 3K

    Al Fakher Launches MINI 3K

    Al Fakher launched the MINI 3K, a “compact and stylish vaping device offering up to 3,000 puffs of rich, smooth flavor.” The device is equipped with a dual-pod system, allowing users to switch flavors easily while maximizing value.

    “In full compliance with the EU Tobacco Products Directive (TPD), the MINI 3K is a safe and legal choice for consumers across the European Union,” the company said. “Each device is clearly labeled and responsibly manufactured to meet the highest regulatory standards.”

  • Bangladesh’s Unchanged Tobacco Taxes Draw Criticism 

    Bangladesh’s Unchanged Tobacco Taxes Draw Criticism 

    Bangladesh’s interim government’s proposed national budget for Fiscal Year 2025-26 (July 2025-June 2026) has drawn criticism from anti-tobacco activists for keeping cigarette prices and taxes unchanged across all tiers. Finance Adviser Dr. Salehuddin Ahmed presented the proposed budget, but activists suggest the decision will deprive the government of at least Tk20,000 crore ($2.4 billion) in additional revenue while making cigarettes more accessible to young smokers.

    Activists urge the government to increase cigarette prices across all tiers, particularly by merging the low and medium tiers—which account for 80% of the market—into a single category with a minimum retail price (MRP) of Tk90 ($1.08) for 10 sticks.

    The budget also leaves bidi prices unchanged for the sixth consecutive time, with supplementary duty remaining static for the 10th straight year. Similarly, taxes on smokeless tobacco products such as jarda and gul remain unaltered, sparking concerns among health advocates.

    While the budget raises the advance tax on cigarette manufacturers from 3% to 5% and increases supplementary duty on imported cigarette paper from 150% to 300%, activists argue these measures fall short of ensuring meaningful public health protection.