Tag: China

  • China: Former Tobacco Head Pleads Guilty on Bribery Charges

    China: Former Tobacco Head Pleads Guilty on Bribery Charges

    Ling Chengxing, former director of the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration of China, pleaded guilty and expressed remorse on charges of bribery and abuse of power in a Changchun court today. He was charged with illegally accepting property worth over 43.1 million yuan ($5.9 million).

    Previously, Ling also held several other high-level positions, including vice-governor of Jiangxi province, the Party committee member of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and general manager of China National Tobacco Corporation.

    According to accusations by the procuratorate in Changchun, between 2006 and 2023, Ling took advantage of his positions to seek benefits for certain units and individuals in project contracting, business operations, and job adjustments. He was also accused of malpractice and abuse of power during the facilitation, review of related investments, and acquisition of equity, causing significant losses to state-owned companies and resulting in particularly severe damage to national interests.

    The court will conclude the trial at a later date.

  • Vaporesso Launches First-Ever Solar Vape

    Vaporesso Launches First-Ever Solar Vape

    Vapporesso launched its Pure Power For All” global eco-empowerment initiative—a testament to the company’s commitment to advancing clean energy solutions and promoting sustainable lifestyles worldwide.

    At the center of this initiative lies the industry’s first solar-powered open-system vape—ECO NANO SOLAR. Crafted from 70% eco-conscious materials, the innovative device features a modular structure with interchangeable components, extending product life while promoting resource efficiency and long-term sustainability, according to a press release.

    This pioneering eco-innovation combines degradable photovoltaic technology with a recyclable modular design. Its solar panel achieves quality light-to-electricity efficiency and is over 80% biodegradable, advancing clean energy adoption while significantly reducing environmental impact, according to the release.

    With the ECO NANO SOLAR, Vaporesso sets a new standard for sustainability in the vaping industry, inspiring a broader shift toward eco-conscious practices and paving the way for a greener future in vaping and beyond.

  • STMA Appoints New Deputy Director

    STMA Appoints New Deputy Director

    China’s State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) has appointed Liu Sanjiang as its deputy director, reports 2Firsts.

    Previously, Liu served as the director of the department of quality development at the State Administration for Market Regulation,

    This appointment follows a series of corruption investigations targeting senior STMA officials.

    The STMA is the country’s official regulatory body overseeing the tobacco industry and market, including NGPs such as e-cigarettes.

  • Brazilian Tobacco Suitable to Ship to China

    Brazilian Tobacco Suitable to Ship to China

    Image: SindiTabaco

    On Aug. 9, the Interstate Tobacco Industry Union (SindiTabaco) hosted a meeting to formalize the closure of the tobacco pre-inspection procedure for the 2023/2024 crop year, one of the requirements of the bilateral trade protocol between Brazil and China. The meeting was held in hybrid format, with the virtual presence of the technicians from the General Administration of Customs China (GACC) and the representative of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply (MAPA) and of the National Organization for Brazilian Phytosanitary Protection (ONPF), Pedro Carneiro Abreu.

    Other authorities from Brazil and China attended the event as well.

    “This is a primordial moment for compliance with the protocol. The samples were collected in a very effective manner, and it is with great satisfaction that I inform you that no pests were detected in the collected samples. This once again corroborates the quality of the Brazilian tobacco. China is one of our largest importers of tobacco, and this partnership plays a fundamental role for the continuity of the businesses between the two countries. We are sure that we will continue making strides in this relation,” commented Abreu from MAPA Brasilia.

    “Our participation consists in representing this commitment, which is also shared by minister Carlos Favaro, besides acknowledging this activity as relevant for the entire country. In our understanding, this expresses our responsibility with regard to the Chinese inspection organs,” said Jose Cleber de Souza, superintendent at MAPA RS.

    The MAPA was in charge of collecting the processed tobacco samples and sending them to the Central Analytical Laboratory of the University of Santa Cruz do Sul (UNISC) for laboratory tests that confirm the phytosanitary status of the product prior to shipment. Roque Danieli, tax auditor and head of MAPA’s Plant Health and Inputs Inspection Service in RS, presented details about the pre-inspection activities.

    “During these 23 days in which we worked jointly with the GACC representatives, in virtual format, it was possible to attest to the quality of the 2023/2024 crop and demonstrate that, at field level, the 2024/[20]25 crop is now under cultivation with all the necessary cares in compliance with the requisites set forth on the protocol. The integrated production system gets the credit for the fact that tobacco is the commercial crop that uses the least amount of pesticides at field level, a result of the constant work of the farm extension agents. We hope that the presentation of the works is cause for satisfaction, and next week, we shall send the final report to Brasilia to be forwarded to the GACC,” Danieli said.

    Zhang Nan Zhengrong, Leader of the China Leaf Company Delegation, presented the pre-inspection report to the attendees of the meeting jointly with the technician responsible for the Central Analytical Laboratory of UNISC, professor Adriana Dupont Schneider. She gave details of the analyses.

    “This year, we analyzed a total of 54 lots with samples collected in eight companies. The laboratory activities took 24 days, and they certified the phytosanitary safety with regard to the nine quarantine pests set forth in the agreement, of which, six are types of insects, two weeds and the fungus known as blue mold. All the results were negative for the pests included in China-Brazil trade protocol,” said Schneider.

    “Tobacco is an agricultural crop that suffers harsh criticism but has been vigorously defended by the MAPA,” said SindiTabaco President Iro Schuenke. “This has a lot to do with the social and economic importance of the crop for our country, especially for the South Region. China is our second-largest importer, coming only after Belgium, and every year purchases big amounts of our tobacco. And this is the moment for a special mention of the farmers that cultivate tobacco in Brazil who, along with the farm extension agents, have performed all the necessary works for our compliance with the necessary requisites that have kept Brazil as top leaf exporter over the past 30 years.”

  • China Tobacco and BAT Meet in Beijing

    China Tobacco and BAT Meet in Beijing

    Photo: Stephen Finn

    Zhang Jianmin, director of China’s State Tobacco Monopoly Administration and general manager of China National Tobacco Corporation, met with a high-level BAT delegation in Beijing, according to Weixin

    The companies reportedly held “friendly talks.”

    Others in attendance included Wang Gongcheng, member of the Party Leadership Group of the National Bureau and deputy director, heads of the State Administration Office (foreign affairs department), the development planning department, China Tobacco Sales Corp. and China Tobacco International.

  • Pulling its Punches

    Pulling its Punches

    Photo: Christoph Burgstedt

    China, the world’s largest supplier of e-cigarettes, has failed to take full advantage of the risk reduction opportunities offered by vapes.

    By George Gay

    An Aug. 27 heading on a story in Singapore’s The Straits Times proclaimed, “300 million and counting: Why China just can’t kick the cigarette habit.” Newspaper headings are normally not written by the writers of stories and are aimed at grabbing the reader’s attention, but they should accurately reflect the story. In this case, however, there is a disconnect because whereas the story credits China with having an estimated 300 million smokers, nowhere does it say that number is rising, which I would expect given that the heading adds “and counting.” Indeed, the story does not claim that volume consumption is heading up, saying rather that such figures are not published.

    Another thing that immediately struck me about the heading was the use of the word “habit” rather than “addiction,” which seemed to suggest two things. One was that the story was not going to follow the course of many stories in other countries where the failure to end or significantly curtail cigarette smoking is put down to an inability on the part of authorities to force/encourage smokers to break their addiction despite their using methods that include everything from making cigarettes unaffordable through requiring manufacturers to degrade these products and insulting smokers in respect of their personal hygiene, to, if those smokers are lucky, encouraging the use of reduced-risk products in place of cigarettes. This story, the heading promised, was going to be about other issues.

    At the same time, the heading seems to question whether kicking smoking is a goal worth pursuing. After all, while the usual definition of addiction involves a compulsion that causes harm to the person indulging in the addictive activity, that is not the case in respect of a habit. After all, somebody might be in the habit of repeatedly looking at their mobile phone while supposedly out enjoying the company of a friend over coffee, which, of itself, is unlikely to cause them direct harm, though they might be in danger from the reaction of a sensitive but increasingly irritated friend sitting across the table, at least in polite societies.

    But hang on, the mood changes in the first sentence of the story, which reports that 20 years after adopting the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control [FCTC], “China is still addicted [my emphasis] to cigarettes.” Overall, the word “habit” occurs four times in the story and the word “addicted” twice. This might seem like a small point, but when the subject is what many people believe is the most preventable cause of disease and death worldwide, a reader should be able to expect that basic issues have been properly considered before going to print. English and, I guess, most other languages have what I would call vague words such as “habit” and “addiction,” which can be useful but which need to be used with caution, and clearly not where such vagueness can lead to confusion.

    I am not saying that it is not valid to use “habit” and “addiction” in reference to the same activity, but at least some attempt should be made to explain the distinction and to use the words, not as simple synonyms, but appropriately each time. I might be happy, for instance, to entertain the idea that for some people, smoking is an addiction that is difficult to break while for others it is a habit they can pick up now and again without becoming addicted, but I cannot accept that for the same individual, smoking can be both a habit and an addiction. 

    Muddled Thinking

    I worry that such issues are not considered properly, not only in the case of the The Straits Times but in stories published around the world every day of the week, something that leads to misunderstandings and pressure being put on politicians to enact unhelpful legislation. The public is served up stories that are beset with muddled thinking. We are told, for instance, in The Straits Times story that despite years of anti-smoking campaigning in China, people continue to smoke partly because cigarettes are cheap, there is a lack of public education, and Big Tobacco—presumably meaning the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) and the China National Tobacco Corporation—is protected. But how is it possible to reconcile the claims that there have been years of anti-smoking campaigning when cigarettes are still cheap? The WHO and most other tobacco control bodies say that tax-induced cigarette price increases comprise the most important factor in getting smokers to quit. And there surely cannot have been years of anti-smoking campaigning without public education. I ask you, to whom was this campaigning directed?

    I am not saying that the claims are irreconcilable, but they do require some explanation. Is the reason that the extensive anti-tobacco campaigning has been unsuccessful down to the fact that China has followed FCTC policies that, overall, do not work, or that do not work in China, or is it the case that China, either intentionally or unintentionally, has not applied them properly?

    In fact, the story suggests that a major reason why anti-tobacco campaigning has had limited success is down to the power of the STMA and the pushback that it employs when anti-smoking policies are put forward, at least outside the biggest cities. I am happy to accept that this happens, but it does raise a question: Why did China sign up to the FCTC when it must have been aware that implementation of its policies was going to be resisted by a powerful state organization? The answer to the first part of the question, why did it sign up to the FCTC, probably comes within the wide-ranging category of “it seemed like a good idea at the time”—perhaps because at that time, China wanted to be seen as part of the international order, or maybe it was for some other, less obvious reason.

    The answer to the second part of the question is possibly more interesting. Could it be that China does not buy into all the negative publicity that surrounds tobacco? In many other parts of the world, the perceived wisdom is that tobacco is overall economically negative, but is this the case in China? Isn’t China, along, perhaps, to a lesser extent, with Brazil, something of a special case because its tobacco industry is highly economically active, from the tobacco fields, through manufacturing, to retail stores and throughout all the supporting industries and businesses that these activities imply? Frankly, it would be odd if China took the same attitude to tobacco as, for instance, the U.K., where there is no commercial tobacco growing and virtually no tobacco manufacturing. Differences in the healthcare systems of the two nations might also mean that economic calculations come up with different results.

    Could it be, also, that China does not buy into the tobacco health debate in the same way that many other countries do? In a world plagued by pollution, perhaps it finds it hard to accept the death toll normally attributed to tobacco smoking alone, as I do. I can think of other reasons why China might take a different view of cigarette consumption to that taken by some other countries, but I don’t want to encourage a sack full of letters of outrage, so I shall keep them to myself.

    A Missed Opportunity

    I am not saying that such thinking comes into play in China. In fact, I would be surprised if it does because, strangely, China seems to forge a tobacco path that is not that much different to the paths forged elsewhere and one where, certainly in places, it is aligned with the WHO’s de facto policies.

    Take reduced-risk products, for instance. One would have thought that in China, vapes would have comprised a powerful tool for allowing smokers to transition away from cigarettes—perhaps a more powerful tool even than it is in many other countries. I say this because The Straits Times story makes the point that smoking plugs into long-established social mores in China, one of which means that cigarettes are considered appropriate business gifts. Elegantly designed vapes would surely make acceptable—perhaps even better—alternatives in this regard and could be made to reflect the often-elegant, iconic branding of cigarettes.

    But China seems not to have taken full advantage of what vapes could offer it, which is especially odd given that, I assume, it is the world’s leading supplier of vaping devices. Rather, it seems to have fallen for the idea that flavored vapes, the vapes most effective in encouraging smokers to switch away from cigarettes, should be banned because they are attractive to young people.

    To me, this is the same sort of muddled thinking that crops up time and again in other countries. But at least it possibly provides an answer to the question implied by The Straits Times. Perhaps China will be able one day to break its cigarette “habit,” but, with one hand tied behind its back, it is going to take an awfully long time.

    But then the reporter from Singapore should understand this. Singapore, I think, once proclaimed that it would quit smoking by 2000, and that was in the days when “quit” meant just that, not reduce the smoking rate to 5 percent or thereabouts. Did it make that deadline? No; a quarter of a century later, it is still a work in progress, and it is likely to be so for many years to come. It likes to operate with two hands tied behind its back—it bans vaping outright.

    George Gay is Tobacco Reporter’s European editor, but his territory spans the globe. Based in London, George has covered the tobacco industry since 1982, initially for a U.K.-based publication and since 2004 for Tobacco Reporter. George’s understanding of industry issues, combined with his keen sense of observation and dry wit, have earned him a loyal following among Tobacco Reporter’s readers.
  • Death Sentence for Former STMA Leader

    Death Sentence for Former STMA Leader

    Image: Wit

    The Intermediate People’s Court of Dalian has sentenced He Zehua, former deputy chief of China’s State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, to death for taking bribes, reports Xinhua.

    The sentence comes with a two-year reprieve, after which the penalty could be commuted to life imprisonment with no possibility of parole or further commutation.

    He was also deprived of his political rights for life, all of his personal property was confiscated, and his illegal gains were turned over to the state treasury. 

    The court found that between 1998 and 2023, He took undue advantage of his various positions, including those as a senior official at local tobacco monopoly agencies, as well as the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration deputy chief, to illegally assist his connections in business operations, project contracting and personnel promotion and recruitment

    In return, He accepted more than RMB943 million ($132.6 million) in money and gifts.

    In its ruling, the court considered the large amounts of money involved and He’s cooperation with the investigators and in returning the illegal gains, which have been recovered in full.

    Several STMA leaders are under investigation for corruption. Earlier this month, authorities arrested former STMA head Ling Chengxing and announced a probe into the activities of STMA Deputy Head Xu Ying.

  • Hong Kong Crackdown Nets $72 Million in Illegal Smokes

    Hong Kong Crackdown Nets $72 Million in Illegal Smokes

    Credit: Timothy S. Donahue

    Hong Kong customs officers seized untaxed cigarettes worth HK563 million ($72.1 million) during a nearly three-month illegal trade crackdown, coinciding with a tobacco tax increase in February.

    Assistant Commissioner Barry Lai Chi-wing said officers clamped down on the post-pandemic trend of smuggling the contraband into the city in small portions from February 19 to May 14 in an operation code-named “Tempest.”

    Part of the operation also took place after Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po announced in this year’s budget that the tobacco tax would be raised by 80 HK cents per stick with immediate effect, according to media reports.

    The increase raised the average cost of a pack of 20 cigarettes by HK$16 to more than HK$90. A pack costs HK$19 to HK$38 on the black market.

    During the operation, 4,347 people, aged 15 to 89, were arrested. Officers confiscated 139 million sticks of suspected illicit cigarettes, 105kg of cigars, and around 1,525kg of manufactured tobacco products, which had a market value of HK625 million. The tax take would have been about HK454 million.

  • China Tightens Smoking Restrictions

    China Tightens Smoking Restrictions

    Photo: Taco Tuinstra

    China is ramping up its efforts to control smoking. In 2023, 44 cities introduced or revised regulations, bringing the total number of cities with relevant regulations to 254 nationwide, according to national health authorities.

    According to the Xinhua News Agency, 24 regions at the provincial level in China have rolled out smoking regulations, and the proportion of the population protected by comprehensive smoke-free regulations is continuing to increase.

    Experts from the National Health Commission (NHC) released the data on Saturday ahead of World No Tobacco Day on May 31.

    Meanwhile, as China pledges to protect 80 percent of its population with smoke-free laws by 2030, experts on tobacco control on Sunday called for the country to introduce a national smoking control regulation as soon as possible.

    Smoking control, including preventing smoking and encouraging smokers to quit, is a viable approach for both population-wide disease prevention and individual healthcare, according to Wang Lu, a health expert from the NHC.

    Curbing smoking doesn’t aim to deprive people of their right to smoke, but to free people from being hurt by secondhand fumes, Zhang Jianshu, a senior expert at the Chinese Association of Tobacco Control, told the Global Times on Sunday.

  • China Tobacco Deputy Head Investigated

    China Tobacco Deputy Head Investigated

    Photo: RomanR

    Chinese authorities are investigating Xu Ying, deputy head of China’s State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, for suspected “severe violations of disciplines and laws,” reports China Daily, citing the Communist Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Commission of Supervision.

    Xu started his career in the administration in 1988. In March 2014, he became the deputy head of the administration.

    Earlier this month, law enforcement officers arrested former STMA head Ling Chengxing on suspicion of accepting bribes and abusing power.