Category: News This Week

  • Clifford Douglas: Let’s End War on Vaping

    Clifford Douglas: Let’s End War on Vaping

    Photo: pavelkant

    It is time to end the internecine warfare over vaping, according to Clifford Douglas, former vice president of Tobacco Control at the American Cancer Society and founder of the Center for Tobacco Control.

    In a recently published commentary, Douglas writes that the U.S. tobacco control community is “letting down tens of millions of adult smokers, their families and friends, healthcare providers and government decision-makers.”

    “I refer to my community’s approach to dealing with electronic cigarettes,” Douglas writes. “We are now neck-deep in intractable internecine warfare between the mainstream tobacco control community, whose primary focus is on protecting youth from the dangers of vaping, and the tobacco harm reduction (THR) community, some of whose scientists are also committed participants in mainstream tobacco control efforts. The THR community emphasizes the potential benefits of vaping for adult smokers who cannot or will not quit smoking otherwise. It seems that ne’er the twain shall meet.”

    There are ways to prevent youth use that won’t inflict harm on adult smokers.

    Darryl Tempest, executive director, CVA

    Vapor advocates welcomed Douglas’ comments.

    “The Canadian Vaping Association (CVA) commends Douglas for trying to bridge the gap between tobacco control and vape advocates,” the CVA wrote in a press note. “In the end, we all have the same goal of a tobacco-free society. The past practices of tobacco companies have caused distrust of the vape industry with regulators and the public. It is important to remember that this industry was created by smokers, for smokers. We don’t want youth vaping and have proposed many reasonable solutions. There are ways to prevent youth use that won’t inflict harm on adult smokers,” said Darryl Tempest, executive director of the CVA.

    Douglas has also formerly served as a special counsel on tobacco issues in the U.S. House of Representatives, as a tobacco control policy advisor for the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Health and the U.S. Surgeon General, and as a lawyer representing injured smokers and state attorneys general in litigation against the tobacco industry.

  • Plant-Based Vaccines to Exceed $584 Million

    Plant-Based Vaccines to Exceed $584 Million

    Photo: Baiya Phytopharm

    The global plant-based vaccines market, currently valued at $43.7 million, will expand at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 50 percent from 2021 to 2028, according to Coherent Market Insights.

    Key trends in the market include increasing research and development activities, increasing cases of influenza, ongoing clinical trials on plant-based vaccine and inorganic activities, such as collaborations by the market players.

    Coherent Market Insights expects increasing research and development activities to bolster growth of the plant-based vaccines market. For instance, on Nov. 10, 2020, Medicago started conducting clinical trials for a plant-based Covid-19 vaccine. Medicago is also developing a VLP Quadrivalent plant-based vaccine for seasonal influenza. Currently, the influenza vaccine is in Phase II of the clinical trial. In both the cases, the company uses Nicotiana benthamiana, an Australian tobacco plant, to produce the vaccine.

    British American Tobacco is also developing a Covid-19 vaccine based on tobacco plants, as are researchers in Thailand.

    According to Coherent Market Insights, plant-based vaccines offer several benefits over conventional egg-based vaccine production in terms of efficiency, production time and enhancing the immune system of the patient.

    However, there is no plant-derived vaccine approved to be marketed for human consumption to date. Challenges to develop effective vaccines include selection of antigen and plant expression host, uniformity of dosage and manufacturing of plant vaccines, according to good manufacturing practice procedures, according to Coherent Market Insights.

  • Critics: TPD Proposals Would Ban Most Vapes

    Critics: TPD Proposals Would Ban Most Vapes

    Photo: areporter

    The Independent European Vape Alliance (IEVA) has expressed concern about “the content and the tone” of the European Commission’s recent report on the application of the Tobacco Products Directive (TPD), which suggests that further restrictions on vapers might be proposed.

    According to the IEVA, the effect of the commission’s proposals would be to ban most vaping products on the market today.

    “While the commission is careful not to say it out loud, its proposals would effectively ban most vaping products available today,” the organization wrote in a press release. “It suggests revising all the unjustifiable limits the last TPD set downward, removing most flavors and banning many of the devices commonly used today. Vapers in the EU would lose most of the products they use to stay away from cigarettes today. A flavor ban alone would, according to the commission’s own figures, remove two-thirds of today’s vaping market.”

    The IEVA says the report fails to acknowledge the concept of harm reduction. “The report fails to acknowledge any of the evidence on the relative risks of vaping and smoking,” the IEVA wrote. “This is despite member state governments running campaigns trying to encourage smokers to switch to vaping. Sante Publique France, for example, has launched an anti-smoking campaign called ‘Je choisis la vapotage’ (‘I choose vaping’), which makes clear that ‘you can use vaping products without taking short-term health risks.’ The commission must take account of best practice in the EU, not ignore it.”

    Some of the report’s proposals on vaping, says the IEVA, could also lead to more young people smoking.

    “Shortly after this report was published, Yale University released the first real world study on the effect of flavor bans on youth smoking prevalence,” the IEVA stated. “In the city of San Francisco, flavored vaping products were banned in 2018. Since then, smoking has doubled among high school students in the area relative to trends in districts without the ban, even when adjusting for individual demographics and other tobacco policies. This study was funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products. There was no industry involvement in the study.”

    The IEVA says the report insufficiently focuses on the real enemy of public health—smoking. “While the commission does question whether the nicotine threshold for vaping products should be lower, it has brushed aside calls from members of the European Parliament to adapt the method for measuring tar, nicotine and carbon monoxide levels in cigarette smoke,” the IEVA wrote. “This combination of policies would ensure that cigarettes deliver far more nicotine—an addictive substance—than vaping products. While there have been no reported deaths in Europe caused by vaping TPD-regulated products, smoking kills half of its regular users.”

  • AOI Promotes Grower Income Diversification

    AOI Promotes Grower Income Diversification

    Photo: AOI

    Alliance One Brazil has partnered with Bayer Crop Science to provide quality maize seeds and agronomic support to smallholder tobacco farmers in Brazil. Through the partnership, Alliance One Brazil’s goal is to help its contracted farmers diversify their income by strengthening the quality and yield of a crop that is complementary to tobacco.

    “Approximately 75 percent of our contracted Brazilian farmers produce maize along with tobacco,” said Helio Moura, AOI’s global agronomy director, in a statement. “By providing our contracted farmers with a high-quality agronomic package for maize, we are helping them improve the quality and yield of the maize crop.”

    “One of our company’s top priorities is the improvement of farmer livelihoods.”

    During the 2020 growing season, Alliance One Brazil implemented a pilot project with 2,300 farmers to evaluate interest in future program participation.

    The team found that farmers appreciated the support and guidance related to maize in addition to the ongoing support related to tobacco.

    As a result of the positive feedback from the farmers, Alliance One Brazil will implement this project across its full farmer base throughout the 2021 crop season.

    Over the next three years, Alliance One Brazil intends to expand the project to include other crops, and AOI will evaluate how the project could be expanded throughout the company’s global operations.

    By providing the necessary support to enhance the crops that they are already growing, we are providing our contracted farmers with the tools they need to diversify their income.

    Helio Moura, global agronomy director, AOI

    “One of our company’s top priorities is the improvement of farmer livelihoods,” Moura added. “By providing the necessary support to enhance the crops that they are already growing, we are providing our contracted farmers with the tools they need to diversify their income. In addition, crop diversification is becoming increasingly important as extreme weather patterns impact crop production. We are excited about the potential for this project and the potential for AOI to scale it at a global level in the future.”

    AOI is profiled in Tobacco Reporter’s June 2021 print edition.

  • U.K.: Local Authorities Ban Outdoor Smoking

    U.K.: Local Authorities Ban Outdoor Smoking

    Photo: Tobacco Reporter archive

    Local authorities in England have started banning smoking in pavement pubs, cafes and restaurants as the government seeks to make England smoke-free in less than a decade, reports The Guardian.

    The rise of outdoor eating during the Covid-19 pandemic has drawn renewed attention to outdoor smoking. A ban on smoking in public places indoors was credited with a big drop in tobacco use in the U.K. Health advocates worry that allowing smoking in outdoor cafes will renormalize the use of cigarettes after a meal or with a drink.

    Last summer, lawmakers failed to push through an amendment to legislation in the House of Lords to make pavements smoke-free.

    Now, Northumberland county council, Durham, North Tyneside, Newcastle and the City of Manchester have all banned smoking on stretches of the pavement where bars, restaurants and cafes are licensed to put out tables. Oxfordshire is also planning to ban smoking from outdoor restaurants.

    Deborah Arnott, the chief executive of Action on Smoking and Health, said the pavement bans were popular with most customers. “Our surveys show that two-thirds of the public want areas outside pubs and cafes to be smoke-free,” she said.

    The paternalists’ argument that we must stop people smoking because it is deadlier than Covid is as specious and illogical as the lockdown skeptics’ counterclaim that the government should do nothing about Covid because it hasn’t banned smoking.

    Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics, the Institute of Economic Affairs

    Pro-smoking groups say local authorities should not interfere. “It’s no business of local councils if adults choose to smoke, and if they smoke outside during working hours, that’s a matter for them and their employer not the council,” Simon Clark, director of Forest, wrote in a statement.

    England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, has warned that the impact of tobacco is worse than Covid. Smoking had probably killed more people than Covid in the same period, he said. Generally, tobacco is estimated to kill 90,000 people a year in the U.K.

    Ireland, too, is reportedly considering a proposal that would eliminate “smoking areas” from outdoor public places such as pubs, offices and parks. “The Irish Heart Foundation has written to government urging that smoking is prohibited in all outdoor areas of pubs and restaurants as Covid-19 restrictions are lifted,” said Irish Heart Foundation Head of Advocacy Chris Macey.

    “We are also campaigning for outdoor smoking bans in parks, playgrounds, college campuses and state-run facilities to safeguard health and further denormalize smoking.”

    Christopher Snowdon, the head of lifestyle economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, said the moves to ban outdoor smoking demonstrate “the warped judgment of public health officialdom.”

    “The paternalists’ argument that we must stop people smoking because it is deadlier than Covid is as specious and illogical as the lockdown skeptics’ counterclaim that the government should do nothing about Covid because it hasn’t banned smoking. Both willfully ignore the issue of infection, which is what turns a health problem into a public health problem,” he wrote in The Telegraph.

    “Battered by lockdowns, the hospitality industry is unlikely to welcome a policy that encourages its customers to stay at home,” Snowdon added.

  • BAT Scrutinized for Links to Belarus Factory

    BAT Scrutinized for Links to Belarus Factory

    Photo: Tobacco Reporter archive

    BAT has come under scrutiny in the U.K. for its links to the Neman Tobacco Factory in Belarus, reports Inews. 

    The state-owned Neman Tobacco Factory in Grodno carries out production for BAT, making products such as Rothmans and Pall Mall for its domestic market.

    Around 10 percent of the 5.5 billion cigarettes sold illegally each year in the U.K. are estimated to have come from Belarus. Experts claim most are made at the Neman factory.

    Recent police seizures of smuggled stock in the U.K. included illicit packets bearing Neman logos and Belarusian health warnings.

    According to Olaf, the EU-wide counter-fraud organization, Belarus is one of the main source countries for cigarettes smuggled into the EU.

    There is no suggestion BAT is aware of any illicit trade, and the firm said it has “strong controls” to stop its products entering the black market.

    “We are satisfied that BAT Belarus applies all the relevant BAT group policies and procedures with regard to combating illicit trade to ensure that products manufactured by GTF Neman under BAT Group’s trademarks are consumed in the Republic of Belarus,” a BAT spokesperson was quoted as saying by Inews.

    Critics have questioned whether BAT should be maintaining ties with Belarus, which has violently cracked down on protests following a rigged election in August 2020.

    “It is outrageous that a major British company continues to have a close relationship with a Belarusian plant, which is 100 percent owned by a Lukashenko regime that tortures its own people,” said a spokesperson for the pro-democracy group Nadzeya-UK.

  • Egypt Amends Invitation for Tobacco Bid

    Egypt Amends Invitation for Tobacco Bid

    Photo: マサコ アーント from Pixabay

    Authorities in Egypt have issued an amended invitation for tobacco companies to bid for a license to manufacture cigarettes, according to Reuters. The amended invitation follows complaints that the terms of the license previously offered were too narrow.

    The state-controlled Eastern Co. currently holds a 70 percent market share, and this new bid for license could end the company’s monopoly.

    Under the amended terms, the winning bidder would produce 1 billion cigarettes per year as opposed to 15 billion cigarettes per year. The updated terms also removed a rule stating any other licenses would not be offered after the tender for a decade.

    The deadline for the amended bid is Aug. 1.

  • Imperial Cleared of Anti-competition Charges

    Imperial Cleared of Anti-competition Charges

    Photo: Taco Tuinstra

    The Supreme Court of Ukraine has thrown out a UAH460 million ($16.83 million) fine imposed by the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) on Imperial Tobacco Ukraine and Imperial Tobacco Production Ukraine for alleged anticompetitive behavior, reports the Kyiv Post.

    In October 2019, the Antimonopoly Committee fined the local affiliates of Philip Morris International, British American Tobacco, Japan Tobacco and Imperial Brands along with Tedis Ukraine. Concerted actions by the tobacco companies had unlawfully left Ukraine with only one cigarette distributor, Tedis, the AMCU maintained.

    Imperial appealed to the Commercial Court of Kyiv, which ruled in favor of the AMCU. On July 21, 2020, the company paid the full fine to prevent the imposition of additional penalties and to avoid further pressure on the company’s operations by the AMCU.

    After an appeal to the Northern Commercial Court of Appeal was also rebuffed, Imperial turned to the Supreme Court, which has now found in its favor.

    In a Ukrainian-language press release, Imperial Tobacco Ukraine CEO Rastislav Cernak said the ruling was an encouraging sign for all foreign investors in Ukraine.

    “Our company has always acted completely transparently and decently, advocating fair and honest competition, observing all antimonopoly laws not only in Ukrainian legislation but also the principles of protecting economic competition laid down in EU legislation,” he was quoted as saying.

    Earlier, Ukrainian courts threw out the AMCU fines against British American Tobacco and Tedis.

    Imperial Tobacco Ukraine manufactures cigarettes in Kyiv. About 50 percent of its products are exported to 20 markets, including Armenia, the United Arab Emirates and the United States.

  • India: ITC Shares Fall With Covid Restrictions

    India: ITC Shares Fall With Covid Restrictions

    Photo: Seemanta Dutta | Dreamstime.com

    Shares of ITC fell nearly 3 percent after the company warned that lockdown restrictions could cause supply chain disruptions soon, according to Reuters.

    ITC’s statement came as its cigarette business barely staged a recovery from last year’s lockdown, according to Reuters. March quarter revenue rose 14 percent to INR58.50 billion ($799.1 million). Cigarette volumes were short of pre-Covid-19 levels toward the end of the year.

    “ITC’s cigarette division posted a strong outperformance versus peers during the year, indicating market share gains. However, fresh restrictions in urban and rural markets may delay cigarette volume recovery going ahead,” the Reuters article states.

    Limited lockdowns were reintroduced following surges in Covid-19 infections in April and May. Analysts at Prabhudas Lilladher stated that the lockdowns are only “temporary hiccups,” according to Reuters, and they expect the first quarter to pick up.

  • FITA Complains About Loose Cigarette Sales

    FITA Complains About Loose Cigarette Sales

    Photo: Tobacco Reporter archive

    The Fair-Trade Independent Tobacco Association (FITA) has filed a criminal complaint with the South African Police Service against British American Tobacco South Africa (BATSA) for violating the Tobacco Products Control Act 83 of 1993 and the Customs and Excise Act 91 of 1964.

    “On or about May 28, 2021, we received information that BATSA and certain retail stores in and around the greater Johannesburg area were contravening provisions of inter alia the Tobacco Products Control Act and the Customs and Excise Act by selling loose cigarettes and giving and/or gifting to the consumer ZAR5 [$0.36] worth of mobile telephone airtime vouchers together with a small rectangular metallic box, which holds up to three loose cigarettes, branded with one of the many BATSA brands,” the organization wrote on its website.

    FITA “conducted test purchases” to confirm the alleged sales and states that it has “photographs and video footage depicting the promotional material and packaging for the sale of loose cigarettes.”

    Selling loose cigarettes and gifting promotional material like the boxes and phone cards is prohibited in South Africa.