Category: News This Week

  • Sales up for Domino

    Domino-Printing-Sciences-HQDomino Printing Sciences posted strong growth in the United States and Germany for the six months ending April 30, 2013, even as trading conditions across the rest of Europe remained difficult. Its Asian businesses performed well, while the company’s digital label press business grew rapidly.

    “Sales in the six months to 30 April 2013 were 7 percent ahead of the comparable period last year,” said Peter Byrom, chairman of Domino Printing Sciences. “New equipment revenues were 7 percent up with strong growth in Asia, USA and Germany, compensating for ongoing difficult trading conditions across most of Europe.”

    In June 2012, Domino Printing Sciences acquired of Graph-Tech, adding technical and integration skills for the development of its digital printing business. The company has subsequently added sales and technical resources to enhance its digital print and color management competencies.

    Research and development expenditure increased by 25 percent during the reporting period.

     

  • Drew Estate acquires Heavenly Cigar

    Drew Estate has acquired the Heavenly Cigar Co. of in Naples, Florida, USA.

    “We are extremely excited about this acquisition and look forward to building the Heavenly cigar brand further across the U.S.,” said Michael Cellucci, president of Drew Estate. “We believe that with our expertise and innovation we have the ability to fully realize the potential of the Heaven line of products.”

    Heavenly Cigar Co.products will be featured at the International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers (IPCPR) Convention and International Trade Show in July at the Drew Estate booth.

    Established in 1996, Drew Estate is a privately held, U.S.-headquartered manufacturer and distributor of premium cigars. Drew Estate’s Nicaraguan factory handcrafts brands such as Liga Privada, La Vieja Habana and Herrera Esteli.

  • Horse trading over products directive could deliver dog’s breakfast

    In their deliberations over the EU’s proposed new Tobacco Products Directive, the various participants in this debate seem intent on falling into the trap of the committee that sets out to design a horse, which should be fine for those who like camels.

    According to a story by Dave Keating for the European Voice, EU member states and members of the European Parliament are on a collision course. “On Friday (June 21), health ministers voted to slightly water down the European Commission’s proposal on tobacco rules,” Keating wrote. ‘”But MEPs want tougher rules that go further than the commission’s proposal.”

    In fact, all sides seem bent on tinkering with the commission’s proposal. Ministers removed from the proposal a ban on slim cigarettes but said these products should be sold in regular-sized packs. And while they backed a proposal for large graphic warnings, they wanted them to take up less pack space (65 percent) than the commission had proposed (75 percent).

    The compromises were apparently made to ease the concerns of central and eastern European member states that believe the commission’s proposals would harm their economies. But the ministers’ amendments failed to satisfy Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Poland and Romania, which voted against the council’s position.

    Some MEPs, on the other hand, want tougher rules, with at least one demanding the introduction of standardized packs without logos or trademarks.

    Four parliamentary committees want the bans on menthol and slim products expunged from the TPD revisions, but the environment and health committee, which is due to vote on July 10, is likely to take a stronger line.

    In so far as the TPD revisions are meant to help protect the health of tobacco consumers, the real damage could be done by attacks on electronic cigarettes, which comprise the product with the most potential to help smokers quit their tobacco habit.

    A plenary session of parliament is scheduled to vote on the TPD revisions during the first half of September.

  • Buildings have no-smoking foundations

    Eight buildings in Jakarta, Indonesia, have been congratulated by the Environment Ministry for their success in implementing no-smoking policies, according to a story by Lenny Tristia Tambun for The Jakarta Globe.

    Muhammad Tauchid, of the Jakarta Environmental Management Agency (BPLHD), said on Wednesday that while the agency had long listed the buildings that violated no-smoking regulations, it was time to express appreciation to those that complied with the regulations.

    The regulations are based on a 2010 bylaw issued by former Jakarta governor Fauzi Bowo that put an end to special smoking rooms.

  • New website to support UK smokers

    Imperial Tobacco has launched Smoke Spots in the UK, a new website aimed at supporting adult smokers and promoting smoker-friendly venues.

    “With this great new initiative, we are giving our consumers the chance to interact and form an online community where they can share great smoking experiences with each other,” said Amy Kiss, head of consumer marketing.

    Smoke Spots is already live in Germany and Austria, but is now being extended to the U.K., with London in the vanguard.

    The website, at http://www.smoke-spots.co.uk, highlights smoker-friendly venues and events.

    The key to the site is said to be its social aspect: forums, blog articles, competitions and links to local events that will help facilitate regular, experience-sharing conversations among smokers.

    “The U.K. is a very important market for us,” said Andy Henwood, head of digital and marketing communications.

    “We’ll be highlighting Smoke Spots through an integrated communication campaign, including social media and a mobile app, and we are confident awareness of this effective tool will quickly grow.

    “We’ll be rolling Smoke Spots out to other cities in the U.K. in due course.”

  • Malaysians reminded of smoking fatwa

    Muslims in Malaysia are being reminded that, for them, smoking has been forbidden, according to a story in The Star.

    The story said that many Muslims in Malaysia were still taking lightly the smoking is haram (forbidden) fatwa (edict) that was issued by the Muzakarah Committee of the National Fatwa Council for Islamic Religious Affairs in 1995.

    The situation has led the assistant minister in the Chief Minister’s office (Islamic Affairs), Datuk Daud Abdul Rahman, to urge Muslims, especially those in the state of Sarawak, to take on board that smoking has been forbidden.

    He said the fatwa issued by the national committee had been agreed upon by the Sarawak Fatwa Council.

    “We do not want our lives to be plagued by habits that are prohibited by Islam as well as detrimental to our health,” he added when opening the state-level Health Fatwa Education Seminar 2013 in Kuching.

    The seminar focused on three issues: smoking, immunization and abortion.

  • JTI recognized as great place to work

    Japan Tobacco International has been selected by the Great Place to Work Institute as one of the 100 Best Workplaces in Europe for 2013, according to a note posted on JTI’s website.

    “Four JTI markets have been qualified in the 25 Best Multinational Workplaces category: Ireland, Italy, Spain, and Turkey,” the note said. ‘This milestone was celebrated on Thursday, June 27, in Dublin at the 11th annual European Best Companies awards ceremony.”

    “JTI strives to hire and retain the best talent in a culturally diverse work environment,” said Ilona Alonso, human resources vice president for JTI’s Western Europe Region.

    “Our culture encourages our employees’ development on many levels. We value their suggestions and reward their efforts. We do this because we care for the long-term interests of our people, and in turn they care for ours. This achievement, along with other awards JTI entities have received over the years, is a further testament to the positive results we saw in our recent Employee Engagement Survey.”

    JTI said that the Great Place to Work Institute launched the first Best Companies to Work For list in conjunction with Fortune magazine in the U.S. and Exame in Brazil more than 20 years ago. The Great Place to Work Institute now recognizes workplaces in nearly 50 countries. For the 2013 Best Workplaces in Europe lists, the Great Place to Work Institute analyzed data provided by more than 2,100 companies that represented more than 1 million employees.

    “Companies in this year’s ranking are developing organizational cultures dedicated to building trust and camaraderie among their employees,” said Robert Levering, co-founder and global CEO of the Great Place to Work Institute. “Inclusion on this list reflects companies’ commitment to continuously improving the quality of life of employees and setting new standards for organizations in the future.”

  • Indonesia maps road to FCTC ratification

    An anti-tobacco network has launched a ‘road map’ it hopes will accelerate Indonesia’s ratification of the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), according to a story in The Jakarta Post.

    The chairman of the Indonesia Tobacco Control Network (ITCN), Kartono Mohamad, said on Monday that Indonesia was one of 10 countries that had not ratified the FCTC.

    Kartono said that cigarette consumption in Indonesia was increasing every year and that the country now had the third-highest number of smokers worldwide.

    The chairman of the road map working group, Sudibyo Markus, said the road map had been produced after an in-depth analysis of the current situation, which was characterized by slow government action, weak law enforcement, high numbers of smokers and a public hazard.

    He said the road map had been divided into five main topics related to public and legal policies, the economy, health, education and socio-cultural issues.

    Meanwhile, Tjandra Yoga Aditama, the director general of the Health Ministry’s Disease Control and Environmental Health department, said the ministry applauded the network for launching the road map. “This represents real action and commitment to controlling tobacco in Indonesia,” Tjandra said.

  • Road map to substantial pitfalls

    In the wake of its issuing its first six judgments on proposed new but ‘substantially equivalent’ tobacco products, the US Food and Drug Administration has issued a ‘brief summary’ on why such applications might fail.

    Under the Tobacco Control Act of 2009, new cigarettes cannot be introduced on the US market without an order from the FDA, and there are two routes to obtaining such an order. One route, for completely new tobacco products, requires a highly detailed review, while a second route provides for products that are ‘substantially equivalent’ to those already on the market.

    The FDA, which is said to have thousands of substantially equivalent applications to deal with, issued six judgments earlier this week, two positive and four negative.

    The FDA said that it might find a new tobacco product to be not substantially equivalent (NSE) because there was inadequate information submitted, or because it found that the new product had different characteristics from the product it was supposed to be equivalent to and information demonstrated that the new product raised different questions of public health.

    ‘Four new tobacco products were found to be not substantially equivalent to specific predicate products due to factors such as inadequate evidence that the proposed predicate products were valid predicates and lack of complete information on the characteristics of the new products and the predicate products,’ it said. ‘After considering all the evidence, the agency determined that there were differences in characteristics between the new products and the predicate products, and there was not an adequate showing that the new products do not raise different questions of public health requiring a premarket tobacco product application.’

    The types of deficiencies FDA found in one or more of these applications are summarized below.

    ‘Predicate: Insufficient information for FDA to determine whether or not the tobacco product that was referenced as a predicate was predicate-eligible. Specifically, adequate evidence was not provided to demonstrate that the predicate product was commercially marketed in the United States as of February 15, 2007.

    ‘Design Features: Inadequate information on design features such as ventilation and filter efficiency. This information is needed to understand if any changes in these characteristics are present and, if they are, whether the new product raises different questions of public health.

    ‘Tobacco Type: Inadequate information on the type of tobacco used in the cigarette. This is a significant deficiency because the type of tobacco can alter the levels of harmful and potentially harmful constituents. This information is needed to understand if any changes in these characteristics are present and, if they are, whether the new product raises different questions of public health.

    ‘Added Chemicals: Where information was provided about the levels of specific ingredients showing they were present at higher levels than in the predicate product, there was not adequate evidence that the changes did not result in the new product not raising different questions of public health. Moreover, some of these ingredients have been shown scientifically to cause both toxicological and dependence concerns. For example, some of these ingredients are listed in the Hazardous Substances Data Bank and have known toxicities.

    ‘Harmful and Potentially Harmful Constituents: Inadequate information regarding “Harmful and Potentially Harmful Constituents” (HPHCs) in new and/or predicate tobacco products and tobacco smoke. Lacking this information, FDA was not able to determine whether the new product raised different questions of public health.’

  • Jordan has high level of smoking doctors

    About 34 per cent of Jordanian doctors are smokers, according to a story in the Jordan Times quoting a report released on Monday.

    The report, entitled ‘The reality of tobacco control in Jordan’, was said to have been based on several past local and global studies.

    It will make uncomfortable reading given that it puts the prevalence of smoking among those aged 11 to 12 at 20 per cent.

    Feras Hawari, director of the King Hussein Cancer Centre’s cancer control office, said that cigarettes, which are consumed by about 93 per cent of smokers, were easy to access and affordable for most people.