Category: News This Week

  • Universal to webcast results conference

    Universal Corp is due to webcast at www.universalcorp.com a conference call on May 21 following the release of its results for fiscal year 2013 after market close on that date.

    The conference call, which will be in listen-only mode, will begin at 17.30 hours Eastern Time and will be hosted by Candace C. Formacek, vice president and treasurer.

    A replay of the webcast conference call will be available until August 5.

    And a taped replay of the call will be available from 20.30 hours on May 21 until June 4 at (855) 859-2056. The telephone replay identification number is 73216156.

  • Shenzhen serious about smoking fines

    Smokers who violate tobacco smoking bans in China’s Shenzhen city are likely to face heavy fines in the future.

    According to a Global Times story, proposed revisions to Shenzhen city’s tobacco control regulations, which were given a public airing yesterday, would see maximum fines raised from Yuan20 to Yuan500.

    Business owners who failed to stop smokers violating bans would be fined up to Yuan30,000.

    Wang Ke’an, director of the Beijing-based ThinktankResearchCenter for Health Development, was said to have told the Global Times that heavy fines were necessary, especially in ensuring that business owners prevented their customers from smoking.

    The fines are just one indication that Shenzhen is becoming serious about enforcing anti-tobacco laws. The number of tobacco control enforcement agencies the city boasts has risen to 12 from one in 1998, the year in which public places smoking bans were introduced, and these agencies are spread across several government departments, including police, transport and education.

    Meanwhile, Yang Gonghuan, deputy director of the ChineseCenter for Disease Control and Prevention, told the Global Times that the keys to enforcement were “supervisory channels and information transparency”.

    The new heavy fines would serve their purpose only once there was a system in place for reporting violators and officials disclosed how reports were dealt with.
    Wang said that efficiency would be improved as the different enforcement agencies started to watch over their own territories, though the question of how the law would be upheld equally by officers from all 12 agencies would still present a challenge.

    But anything is better than nothing. In the 14 years following the introduction of smoking bans in 1998, no Yuan20 fines were imposed.

  • Smoking down but cigarette litter up

    The number of cigarette butts found on UK beaches doubled between September 2011 and September 2012, and the amount of smoking-related detritus rose by 90 per cent, according to an ITV Network report quoting the Marine Conservation Society’s (MCS) annual study of beach litter, Beachwatch Big Weekend.

    Overall, litter levels were at their highest level since 2008, and the number of items of rubbish found per kilometre of beach was up from 1,741 in 2011 to just more than 2,000 in 2012.

    The MCS said that the rise in smoking-related litter [at a time when smoking is in decline] could be a consequence of more people smoking outside as a result of smoking bans, and dropping their butts rather than putting them in ashtrays.

    However, tobacco-related litter was not the main offender. About 65 per cent of the litter recorded was made of plastic, with unidentified scraps of plastic topping the table for the most commonly found litter.

    After pieces of plastic, the most commonly found items were crisp, lolly and sweet wrappers, bits of string and cord, caps and lids, pieces of polystyrene, and drinks bottles. The other items making up the top 10 litter list were fishing netting, cigarette stubs, pieces of glass, and fishing line.

  • Smoking shelter a sign of the times?

    Workers at Dublin’s Convention Centre are to get a smoking shelter three years after the facility was opened, according to a story by Alan O’Keeffe for the Evening Herald.

    That such a shelter should be built now is possibly an indication that attitudes to smokers are softening in certain places and in certain respects – that the process of smoker denormalization put in train some years ago is now in reverse.

    A spokeswoman for the Convention Centre told the Herald the shelter, for which a planning application has been lodged, would allow smokers among the staff to have “a bit of comfort” when they lit up.

    To date, they have had no protection from the elements when smoking outside near a rear staff entrance.

  • Lorillard declares dividend

    Lorillard yesterday declared a quarterly dividend on its common stock of $0.55 per share, payable on June 10 to stockholders of record as of May 31.

  • Aussies to jack up tobacco tax in 2014

    The price of a pack of cigarettes will rise by about $0.07 next year in Australia, according to a story in the Herald Sun.

    The increase will see the government face a potential re-election tussle with tobacco companies and retailers, who are still smarting over plain packaging laws.

    Cigarettes were the only sin tax targeted by Treasurer Wayne Swan’s big-cutting budget. Last year’s budget saw an increase on taxes on beer and cut the number of duty-free cigarettes Australians could bring home after travelling overseas.

    The duty free cuts last year were set to raise $175 million by 2015.

    A pack of 25 cigarettes will be $0.07 more expensive from the first half of 2014, after a change in indexation that sees tobacco excise keep pace with salary rises. Budget papers did not reveal how much this would raise.

  • New tender for tobacconists in Hungary

    Hungary’s national tobacco company has put out a new tender for tobacconists who were not granted a concession in a recent bid, a government official said on Tuesday.

    Thanks to the new tender, tobacconists who would otherwise be obliged to give up their business as of June 30 will be given an opportunity to try again, state secretary at the Development Ministry Janos Fonagy said in parliament on Tuesday in reply to a question by the radical nationalist Jobbik party, according to a story published on the politics.hu website.

    Parties of the opposition have sharply criticised the government for the earlier tobacco tender, insisting that members of the ruling Fidesz party influenced the tender process.

    Legislation approved last September established a state monopoly on the retail sale of tobacco products from July 1, 2013.

  • $2.87 per pack tax possible in Calif.

    California lawmakers chose not to make smokers pay more for health insurance,  but they may be more willing to make smokers pay more for cigarettes.

    A new bill proposing to raise the tax on tobacco by $2 per pack of cigarettes  cleared its first two committee votes last week in predictably partisan votes. SB 768, by Sen. Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles), would raise  the price of cigarettes to more than $8 a pack and generate about $1.4 billion a  year. De León proposes the money be used to offset costs of medical care for  tobacco-related diseases, anti-tobacco education and smoking-cessation  programs.

    The Senate Governance and Finance Committee approved the bill in a 5-2 vote  and the Senate Committee on Health approved it 6-2. All “yes” votes were  Democrats. All “no” votes were Republican.

    “Taxpayers pay $3.1 billion a year to subsidize this industry,” de León told  the health committee, citing an estimate for California’s annual medical costs  for tobacco-related diseases and health problems.

    “On a fiscal level, the price is much too high, and taxpayers have been  footing the bill for much too long,” de León said.

    California, which hasn’t increased taxes on tobacco since 1998, now charges  $0.87 cents on each pack of cigarettes and ranks 33rd in the country in tobacco  taxation. De Leon’s bill would move the state into fourth place.

  • Sticky story: 3rd-hand smoke gives guests gooey fingers

    Anyone who has ever walked into a “non-smoking” hotel room and caught the distinct odor of cigarette smoke will not be surprised by the findings of a new study: When a hotel allows smoking in any of its rooms, the smoke gets into all of its rooms, the study suggests, according to a story in USA Today.

    Nicotine residues and other chemical traces “don’t stay in the smoking rooms,” says Georg Matt, a psychologist from San Diego State University who led the study, published Monday in the journal Tobacco Control. “They end up in the hallways and in other rooms, including non-smoking rooms.”

    The study found smoke residue on surfaces and in the air of both smoking and non-smoking rooms in 30 California hotels where smoking was allowed. Levels were highest in the smoking rooms, but levels in non-smoking rooms were much higher than those found at 10 smoke-free hotels.

    Volunteers who stayed overnight in the smoking hotels also ended up with sticky nicotine residues on their fingers, whether they stayed in smoking rooms or not. Urine tests found additional evidence of nicotine exposure in those who stayed in smoking rooms, but not those who stayed in the non-smoking rooms.

  • Canadian tobacco giants begin defense in $27 billion suit

    Three of Canada’s tobacco giants began their defense Monday against a $27-billion class-action lawsuit in Montreal by calling a witness who said the dangers of smoking are no secret.

    Historian and professor Jacques Lacoursière testified tobacco’s health risks have been common knowledge for decades. He pointed to over 700 references to the hazards of smoking dating back to the 1950s, including TV and radio reports, school manuals, government releases and health professionals.

    One of the many examples included a newspaper article that outlined a significant increase in lung cancer risk following the prolonged use of cigarettes. The proceedings will continue on Tuesday with the plaintiffs’ cross-examination of Lacoursière.

    “What these historians miss is all the coverage that came out in the media about how the industry was involved in a conspiracy to hide all that information,” said Damphousse François, the Quebec director of the Non-Smoker’s Rights Association.

    “They knew about the health effects of their products, but they didn’t meet the obligation to inform their public about what they knew.”

    The class-action lawsuit, which is being touted as the biggest civil case in Canadian history, was first filed years ago. The complainants, two groups of individuals representing a total of 1.8 million Quebecers, allege three tobacco companies did everything possible to encourage addiction:

    • Imperial Tobacco.
    • JTI-MacDonald.
    • Rothmans, Benson & Hedges.

    One group involves individuals who have become seriously ill from smoking, and members of the other group say they are unable to quit smoking.