Tag: Hong Kong

Hong Kong: Record Seizures of Cigarettes

Photo: Kal’vān
Hong Kong authorities confiscated HKD1.23 billion ($157 million) worth of illicit cigarettes to date this year—the largest haul of the contraband in 20 years, reports the South China Morning Post, citing figures from the Customs and Excise Department.
As of Sept. 22 this year, customs officials had seized about 440 million untaxed cigarettes, well above the 427 million cigarettes worth HKD1.19 billion found in the whole of 2021.
If legally imported, this year’s contraband would have generated HKD839 million in tax, according to a law enforcement source.
The source attributed the rise in contraband seizures to the resumption of seaborn logistics after Covid-19 disruptions and a possible rise in the price of tobacco products in Europe.
“As the resumption of seaborne logistics business in May, syndicates have started to accumulate their storage of illicit cigarettes in the city while trying to find buyers in Hong Kong and overseas,” the source told the South China Morning Post.
He said some of the gangs also stockpiled a huge volume of illicit cigarettes in the city as they anticipated a possible rise in the price of tobacco products in Europe amid high inflation.
This year’s seizures reached 440 million cigarettes after authorities discovered 21.6 million untaxed cigarettes worth HKD59 million hidden in two shipping containers in Tsing Yi and Yuen Long in their latest operation on Sept. 19.
September 23, 2022
Hong Kong Police Make First E-Cig Ban Arrests

Photo: Svetliy | Adobe Stock
Hong Kong police arrested two men, who are being held in custody under suspicion of selling and possessing a poison in Part 1 of the Pharmacy and Poisons Regulations as well as selling alternative smoking products, according to a report in the South China Morning Post. The arrests follow the implementation of a new e-cigarette ban.
The new law went into effect last weekend, banning the import, sale and manufacture of electronic cigarettes, heated-tobacco products and herbal cigarettes. Those caught breaking the law are subject to a maximum fine of HKD50,000 ($6,370) and six months’ imprisonment. Under the law, consumers are still allowed to use vaping products.
Police seized 94 boxes of suspected nicotine-containing electronic cigarette cartridges and 74 smoking devices from a mobile retail outlet in Mong Kok.
“The government appeals to smokers to quit smoking as early as possible for their own health and that of others,” said a Department of Health spokesperson.
May 6, 2022
Hong Kong Bans E-Cigarettes

Photo: Earnest Tse
Hong Kong’s ban on the importation and sale of alternative smoking products, including vaping and heat-not-burn products, took effect on April 30, reports ABS-CBN.
The Smoking (Public Health) (Amendment) Ordinance 2021 also prohibits using or carrying an activated vaping device in no-smoking areas. Offenders risk a fine of HKD1,500 ($191).
The ban covers electronic smoking products, heated-tobacco products, herbal cigarettes and their accessories, according to The Star.
The ordinance also prohibits the promotion, manufacture and possession for commercial purposes of novel tobacco products. Those convicted of violating the law will be fined HKD50,000 and imprisoned for six months.
Several vape shops have already closed as a result of the ban, according to news reports. Sales before the ban took effect increased dramatically as users stocked up on products before they could no longer buy them legally.
Heated Tobacco Concern Group HK said that the ban could encourage the smoking of traditional combustible cigarettes; about 90 percent of more than 800 vapers polled last year stated they would use traditional cigarettes following a ban on e-cigarettes. The other 10 percent indicated that they would buy alternative products on the black market.
“The new policy has left users with no choice but to smoke traditional cigarettes,” said Joe Lo Kai-lut, convener of Heated Tobacco Concern Group HK. “It is a bad thing for public health … I hope the government will review the policy by looking into other countries’ regulatory measures.”
Hong Kong customs arrested 11 people on charges of smuggling vaping and heated-tobacco products and confiscated HKD15 million worth of e-cigarettes and heated-tobacco products on Friday.
Given Hong Kong’s proximity to Shenzhen—the world’s largest manufacturing hub for vapor devices, authorities are expected to have their work cut out in enforcing the ban.
May 2, 2022
Opponents Dig in Ahead of New Products Debate

Photo: Prism6 Production
Opponents and proponents of vaping are ramping up pressure as Hong Kong’s legislative council prepares to take up the Smoking (Public Health) (Amendment) Bill 2019, which aims to ban e-cigarettes and heated-tobacco products.
According to a report in South China Morning Post, the government wants the legislative council to approve the law before the end of its session in October, and it could be in force as early as April.
On Sept. 3, the Heated-Tobacco Concern Group released a study showing that 90 percent of 882 surveyed heated-tobacco product users would turn to traditional cigarettes in the event of a total ban. The remaining 10 percent said they would continue to use heated-tobacco products but buy them on the black market.
But Judith Mackay, director of the Asian Consultancy on Tobacco Control, said all forms of tobacco use were harmful and no level of exposure was safe. “These new products offer a new, trendy, exciting way of using tobacco and nicotine, accompanied by appalling advertising directed at children,” Mackay said. “Once the genie is out of the bottle, it cannot be put back.”
Lawmakers have been mulling a crackdown on alternative tobacco products since 2014, but with the city’s largest political party indicating it will back the bill, a ban now appears more likely than before.
September 6, 2021
Hong Kong: Vapor Ban Threat Lifted

Photo: carloyuen from Pixabay
Asian consumer advocacy groups and tobacco harm reduction advocates have welcomed Hong Kong Legislative Council’s (Legco) decision to suspend discussions on a proposed ban of vapor products, saying this will provide smokers with safer smoke-free alternatives.

On June 2, Legco’s bills committee on smoking announced it had ceased discussions over the proposed ban on electronic cigarettes, heat-not-burn tobacco products (HTPs) and other electronic nicotine-delivery systems.

Some committee members strongly opposed the measure, citing scientific studies showing that e-cigarettes, HTPs and the like have lower levels of toxicants than combustible cigarettes.

IQOSER, a heated-tobacco concern group in Hong Kong, said the end of discussions on the proposed ban would hopefully bring lawmakers’ attention to the problem of smoking in the territory.

“Smoking incidence remains at more than 10 percent in Hong Kong, which means a tenth of our population is exposed to the health risks brought about by toxicants found in tar, the by-product of tobacco smoke,” said Joe Lo of IQOSER, a member of the Coalition of Asia Pacific Tobacco Harm Reduction Advocates.
June 16, 2020
Vaporous draft law
The Government of Hong Kong seems to be intent on bringing in a vaping law that does not ally with its own policy on vaping.
According to a story in The Hong Kong Free Press, a proposed draft law states that anyone who imports, manufactures, sells, distributes, possesses [basically, commercial quantities] or promotes alternative smoking products, including e-cigarettes, heat-not-burn products and herbal cigarettes, will be subject to a maximum HK$50,000 fine and six months behind bars.
But the territory’s deputy secretary for food and health Amy Yuen said at a press conference on Wednesday that the draft law did not intend to criminalize those who used alternative smoking products. “It may not be feasible if we ban the use of these products,”. “We also don’t want to disturb people too much.”
It was not clear from the story how it could be that making vaping devices unavailable on the open market would not amount to disturbing users ‘too much’.
Nevertheless, it is apparent that the authorities accept that people will continue to use these products, presumably by buying them on the black market, because the draft law makes provision for punishing people for using alternative smoking products in non-smoking areas: either with a fixed penalty of HK$1,500 or a fine of HK$5,000 upon conviction.
The thinking behind the policy seems deeply flawed. “For users of these new products, the answer is not to go back to conventional smoking products,” Yuen was quoted as saying. “This is not what we are trying to do. We want them to quit altogether.”
Yuen apparently gave no suggestion as to how a former smoker, still addicted to nicotine and deprived of her vaping device, could prevent herself from returning to smoking.
On the question of travellers, Yuen said the government was inclined to adopt a measure applied in Singapore whereby, for a limited time, tourists could surrender their alternative smoking products at the airport. Presumably, thereafter they will be banged up for six months.
The first and second readings of the draft law are due next Wednesday.
The government said it hoped the law would be effective six months after it is passed by the legislature.
February 14, 2019
Traditional quitting
A hospital in Hong Kong is using acupuncture and counseling to help people quit smoking, according to a story by Li Bingcun for the China Daily.
The basic course comprises six acupuncture treatments and four face-to-face counseling sessions during the first month.
If the patient quits smoking during those first four weeks, a practitioner monitors his or her progress at 26 weeks and 52 weeks.
If the first month’s treatment doesn’t work, patients are encouraged to continue visiting over the following year via a follow-up service, which places no limit on the number of visits that may be made.
Li said that many smokers had turned to ‘ancient remedies’ in a last-ditch effort to quit their habit.
More than 10,000 smokers in Hong Kong had used the smoking cessation program offered by the hospital since 2010.
The program is reportedly Hong Kong’s first smoking-cessation program to be based on traditional Chinese medicine.
January 30, 2019
Hong Kong asked to reflect
Fontem Ventures, the business behind blu® e-vapor products, today submitted to the Hong Kong Chief Executive’s office evidence that vaping can contribute to tobacco harm reduction and potentially improve health outcomes for Hong Kong’s adult smokers.
“We are asking the Hong Kong government to reconsider their proposal for a blanket ban on vaping, which will impact the lives of current adult vapers, and those smokers who may consider switching to a potentially less harmful product,” said Hon Lik, the inventor of the original e-cigarette and a consultant to Fontem Ventures’ research & development team.
“We understand Hong Kong’s cautious stance on vaping and its concern over the reports of vaping by minors in the US,” he said. “Nevertheless, prohibition is likely to be counter-productive, and the evidence from countries including the US and the UK suggests pragmatic regulation of vaping can help accelerate declines in smoking rates among adults.”
In its filing, Fontem said e-vapor devices should be made legal for purchase by adults in Hong Kong, and that adult smokers should be empowered to make informed choices.
November 14, 2018
Ban defies logic
A commentator writing in the South China Morning Post has questioned the rationale behind a recently-announced ban on electronic cigarettes in Hong Kong.
Stephen Vines said that one thing no one had expected from Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s policy address of last week was a frontal attack on Hong Kong’s long-standing commitment to free and open markets.
However, in announcing a ban on the sale of e-cigarettes, she had delivered a mighty blow to this commitment, while providing a rationale that defied logic.
‘The ban is based on some seriously flawed arguments if indeed, as claimed, it has arisen from public health concerns,’ Vines said.
‘Those promoting the ban have overexcitedly argued that vaping either poses a greater health risk than tobacco consumption, or is just as bad. They have focused their concern on the attraction e-cigarettes hold for the young and cited controversial evidence that vaping does nothing to reduce tobacco consumption.
‘Even if all these arguments are valid on health and social grounds – a bit of stretch, but let’s go with it for the moment – there is a fundamental illogicality here.
‘If vaping is just as bad or almost as bad as smoking tobacco why on earth has the sale of tobacco products not been banned? If e-cigarettes present a particular threat to the health of young people, why is nothing being done to eliminate much greater, proven health risks involving products targeted at young people that are full of carbohydrates and unsaturated fats – not forgetting the menace of monosodium glutamate that is heavily used in Hong Kong?’
The full comment is here.
October 18, 2018
Tobacco ban threat
Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor said on Thursday it was worth considering banning traditional tobacco products, according to a story at ejinsight.com citing reports by Apple Daily and the Hong Kong Economic Journal.
Lam’s statement on a possible tobacco-products ban came the day after she announced the Government’s intention to impose a ban on electronic cigarettes. She had been asked during a radio interview why, if it were concerned about public health, the Government wanted to ban e-cigarettes but not traditional tobacco.
Her latest remarks were an apparent about-face. Lam said on Wednesday it was not proper to ban abruptly a long-existing commercial activity, referring to the sale of traditional tobacco products.
The chief executive said that she was bold enough to impose a total ban on traditional tobacco, but that there were a lot of pros and cons that needed to be considered before doing so.
She said also that the prevalence of smoking among people aged 15 and older had dropped to 10 percent from 20 percent in the 1980s, indicating that Government efforts to reduce smoking had been successful.
Meanwhile, the Secretary for Food and Health Professor Sophia Chan Siu-chee said the policy of banning the importation, manufacture, sale, distribution and advertisement of e-cigarettes had been finalized and would not be changed.
There are concerns that e-cigarette smokers will be forced to return to traditional cigarettes once the ban takes effect, but Chan said that was mere speculation and not supported by data.
A study conducted last month by the Foundation for a Smoke-Free World showed more than six in 10 adult smokers said they relied on e-cigarettes to help them quit smoking.
Chan said authorities would step up efforts at tobacco control after implementation of the e-cigarette ban.
October 15, 2018