Category: News This Week

‘Industry Jobs Threatened’
Tobacco associations in Indonesia have cautioned that the health ministry’s plan to increase the size of mandatory health warnings to 90 percent of a cigarette pack will adversely affect workers throughout the supply chain, reports Tempo.
“For the past five years, there have been more than 90,000 factory workers who were laid off,” said Muhaimin Moeftie, chairman of the Indonesian Light Cigarette Producers Association.
Between 2007 and 2019, the number of tobacco producers in Indonesia declined from 4,000 to 700, according to Moeftie, whose concerns where echoed by the Indonesian Cigarette Industry Community Forums and Cigarette Producers Association.
The associations said that increasing the size of the warning on a cigarette pack would threaten the sustainability of the industry and the income of 6 million people.
November 20, 2019
Vaping Ban Planned
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday said he will ban the import and public use of vapor devices, citing health concerns.
Duterte said those who will violate his order will be arrested. “I am now ordering the law enforcement agencies to arrest anybody vaping in public,” he said, comparing vaping to smoking.
Earlier, the Philippines reported its first vaping-related illness. According to the Department of Health (DOH), a teenage girl was admitted to hospital on Oct. 21 complaining of “sudden onset severe shortness of breath.”
The DOH called for an outright ban on vaping earlier as it warned Filipinos that e-cigarettes are not a proven nicotine-replacement therapy and can cause lung illness.
Around 1 million Filipinos use e-cigarettes, according to the DOH.
November 20, 2019
California Sues Juul
California is suing Juul Labs for marketing its products directly to underage teenagers and failing to include health warnings.
Announced on Monday by state Attorney General Xavier Becerra, the lawsuit alleges that the San Francisco company contributed to a public health epidemic by selling tobacco products directly to minors. The suit also accuses Juul Labs of violating the privacy of minors by sending marketing emails to those who failed the age verification on Juul Labs’ website.
The suit also alleges that Juul Labs neglected to inform consumers about health risks associated with the product, such as chemicals linked to cancer and the potential for reproductive harm.
“Juul adopted the tobacco industry’s infamous playbook, employing advertisements that had no regard for public health and searching out vulnerable targets,” Becerra said in a press release.
Since Juul’s launch in 2015, youth vaping in the United States has almost doubled, according to a press statement published by the California Department of Justice. From 2017 to 2019, e-cigarette use among high school students rose by 135 percent. The majority of underage e-cigarette users report that Juul is their usual brand.
A spokesperson for Juul Labs said the company is “focused on resetting the vapor category in the U.S. and earning the trust of society by working cooperatively with attorneys general, regulators, public health officials and other stakeholders to combat underage use and convert adult smokers from combustible cigarettes.”
November 19, 2019
Trump Wavers on Flavor Ban
U.S. President Donald Trump appears receptive to arguments from vapor advocates that a blanket ban of e-liquid flavors could provoke a political backlash from voters, according to an article in The New York Times.
After announcing bold action in September, the president has resisted moving forward, saying he wants to further study the issue.
An announcement on sweeping vapor product restrictions, scheduled for Nov. 5, was reportedly canceled following warnings from presidential advisers about political repercussions.
On Nov. 11, Trump tweeted that he would be meeting with representatives of the vapor industry, together with medical professionals and individual state representatives, “to come up with an acceptable solution to the vaping and e-cigarette dilemma.”
The president has been subjected to an intense lobbying campaign waged by tobacco and vapor companies along with conservative organizations, like Americans for Tax Reform, which are opposed to regulatory limits that would affect retailers, small businesses and adult vapers.
Some have promoted enforcing sales restrictions to protect minors or raising the national age to 21 for sales of all tobacco products.
The New York Times article compared the trajectory of the flavor ban—from a bold pronouncement of swift action to a fizzle after the political realities of taking such an action emerge—to Trump’s stance on gun legislation.
After mass shootings in Texas and Ohio, Trump said he wanted to pass “very meaningful background checks.” But warnings from gun rights advocates and Republican lawmakers about the political fallout ensured that ultimately no action was taken.
November 19, 2019
STG Reports Results
Niels Frederiksen
Scandinavian Tobacco Group (STG) reported net sales of DKK1.85 billion ($273 million) in the third quarter of 2019, down from DKK1.89 billion in the comparable 2018 period.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization and before special items were DKK446 million compared with DKK398 million during the third quarter of 2018.
“In the third quarter of the year, we deliver organic EBITDA growth of 5.4 percent, continued margin improvements and a strong free cash flow despite a disappointing development in organic net sales,” said STG CEO Niels Frederiksen.
“This follows better-than-expected progress from our transformational program Fueling the Growth and continued cash flow focus across our business. During the quarter, we were also able to announce our intention to acquire Royal Agio Cigars—a significant step in support of our ambition to become the undisputed leader in cigars and pipe tobacco.”
STG revised its full-year guidance for free cash flow to about DKK1 billion. The revised expectation includes transaction costs from the Royal Agio Cigars acquisition of about DKK20 million, costs for the closure of STG’s Lane facility in the U.S. of up to DKK120 million and lower than previously anticipated costs relating to the Fueling the Growth program.
November 18, 2019
New COO at Turning Point
Turning Point Brands has promoted Graham A. Purdy to chief operating officer.
Since joining the company in 2004, Purdy has held a range of leadership positions. Among other accomplishments, he built and ran the company’s sales organization, launched the Nu-X new product development engine and led transaction teams for many of the company’s strategic initiatives.
In his new role as chief operating officer, Purdy will oversee the day-to-day operations of the business.
“I have worked with Graham for the past 15 years. He has great intuition for the consumer, anticipates new market trends and builds strong internal processes to capitalize on those growth opportunities,” said Larry Wexler, president and chief executive of Turning Point Brands.
“I am eager and excited to help build upon the company’s legacy of success,” said Purdy. “Moving forward, we intend to accelerate the momentum behind our Stoker’s MST brand, broaden the iconic ZIG-ZAG portfolio and provide adult consumers with a broad range of exciting new products in the burgeoning actives market.”
November 18, 2019
Cannabis Credentials
A2LA has renewed accreditation of Global Laboratory Services (GLS) to ISO/IEC 17025:2017 for cannabis testing. Based in Wilson, North Carolina, USA, GLS is the first cannabis testing laboratory accredited in the state.
ISO/IEC 17025 accreditation confirms that laboratories have management, quality and technical systems in place to ensure accurate and reliable analyses as well as proper administrative processes to ensure that all aspects related to the sample, the analysis and the reporting are standardized, measured and monitored.
“At Global Laboratory Services, we always strive to keep pace with industry needs,” said Kim Hesse, business development manager at GLS. “We saw the need for an accredited laboratory in the hemp industry and therefore added CBD and THC testing to our scope. Our next step is to expand our service offerings to include agrochemical analysis of industrial hemp.”
A2LA is an independent nonprofit accreditation body in the United States.
GLS is a subsidiary of Universal Leaf Tobacco Co.
November 18, 2019
Vaping Death in Belgium
An 18-year-old has become the first person to die of vaping in Belgium after authorities blamed his respiratory failure on e-cigarette use, according to a report in The Brussels Times.
The vaper, who lived in Brussels, died on Nov. 6 after using a device with cannabidiol (CBD), a popular and legal hemp component with mild soothing properties that is also sold on the black market mixed with illicit and dangerous products.
“The link with the electronic cigarette is established,” said Health Minister Maggie De Block when questioned in Belgian parliament. “There is no other explanation for such severe pneumonia in this patient.”
The case follows an outbreak of vaping-related hospitalizations and deaths in the United States that have been mostly blamed on vitamin E acetate, a thickening agent in vaping oil.
November 18, 2019
Damages in Engle Case
Jurors ordered R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and Philip Morris USA to pay $148 million in punitive damages, bringing the total award in the death of a Florida smoker to $157 million.
Friday’s decision, which imposes $74.1 million each against R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris, is added to a $9.2 million compensatory award handed down last week for the respiratory disease-related death of Edward Caprio.
The lawsuit is among thousands of claims that stem from Engle v. Liggett Group Inc., a 1994 Florida state court class action case against U.S. tobacco companies. The state’s supreme court ultimately decertified the class but ruled that “Engle progeny” cases may be tried individually.
Caprio had originally filed suit against the companies while suffering from respiratory disease but died three years after a partial verdict in a 2015 trial against the tobacco companies left his claims unresolved.
The award is the largest in years in Florida’s Engle progeny class of tobacco cases. In July 2014, jurors in Pensacola handed down a $23.6 billion verdict against R.J. Reynolds for Michael Johnson’s 1996 cancer death. That award was ultimately thrown out on appeal.
November 18, 2019
Apple Ditches Vaping Apps
Apple has removed 181 vaping-related apps from its app store, citing health concerns, reports CNN.
“Recently, experts ranging from the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] to the American Heart Association have attributed a variety of lung injuries and fatalities to e-cigarette and vaping products, going so far as to call the spread of these devices a public health crisis and a youth epidemic. We agree, and we’ve updated our app store review guidelines to reflect that apps encouraging or facilitating the use of these products are not permitted,” the company said in a statement.
Apple said the apps are a mix of stores, social networks, news and games and represent 0.00010 percent of the 1.8 million apps available through the app store.
The apps now banned from the app store will continue to work for customers who already have them downloaded on their devices, and they can be transferred to new devices.
Apple’s move was applauded by groups such as the American Heart Association and the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.
November 18, 2019