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Ruling Does Not Address Legality of Trademark Ban Under International Law

Dec 17th, 2015
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http://investors.pmi.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=146476&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2123843

Press Release

Philip Morris Asia Limited Comments on Tribunal’s Decision to Decline Jurisdiction in Arbitration Against Commonwealth of Australia Over Plain Packaging

Ruling Does Not Address Legality of Trademark Ban Under International Law

HONG KONG–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Dec. 17, 2015– Philip Morris Asia Limited (PMAL), a Hong Kong company that is the parent of Philip Morris Australia, said today that an arbitral tribunal has declined jurisdiction to hear the merits of PMAL’s case against the Commonwealth of Australia under Australia’s 1993 Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (IPPA) with Hong Kong.

“There is nothing in today’s outcome that addresses, let alone validates, plain packaging in Australia or anywhere else,” said Marc Firestone, Philip Morris International Senior Vice President and General Counsel. “It is regrettable that the outcome hinged entirely on a procedural issue that Australia chose to advocate instead of confronting head on the merits of whether plain packaging is legal or even works”.

PMAL filed its claims under the IPPA on November 21, 2011, when the Australian government passed plain packaging legislation. PMAL asserted that the sweeping ban on trademarks breaches the foreign investment protections that the Australian government guaranteed in its IPPA with Hong Kong.

Firestone continued, “This case has never been about a government’s undeniable authority to regulate in the public interest. Nor has there ever been any question that tobacco products merit strict oversight. In our view, the real point is simply this: Even when pursuing tobacco control objectives, governments are still accountable if they choose to use unlawful means. This is the essence of the rule of law.”

The Australian government’s tobacco packaging policy remains the subject of international disagreement. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is currently considering challenges to Australia’s legislation by four WTO Members. Separately, courts in Europe are also assessing plain packaging under national and international law. The decision on jurisdiction under the Australia-Hong Kong IPPA has no bearing on any of these proceedings.

Australia’s former Labor government made bold promises regarding the public health benefits that its excessive, expropriatory trademark ban — which it labeled a policy experiment – would yield. Three years into the experiment, data from a range of sources consistently demonstrate that the promised outcomes are not being delivered.

PMAL is reviewing the Tribunal’s decision in detail and will determine any further course of action.

###

Philip Morris International Inc.

Philip Morris International Inc. (PMI) is the leading international tobacco company, with six of the world’s top 15 international brands, including Marlboro, the number one cigarette brand worldwide. PMI’s products are sold in more than 180 markets. In 2014, the company held an estimated 15.5% share of the total international cigarette market outside of the U.S., or 28.5% excluding the People’s Republic of China and the U.S. For more information, see www.pmi.com.

Philip Morris Asia Limited

Philip Morris Asia Limited (PMAL) manages PMI’s business in the Asia region. PMA is based in Hong Kong where the company was incorporated under the Hong Kong Companies Ordinance in 1994. PMAL owns the Australian affiliate, Philip Morris Limited (PML).

Philip Morris Limited

Philip Morris Limited (PML) began operations in Australia in 1954 as the first affiliate outside of the United States. Based in Melbourne, PML employs more than 500 people and is the second largest distributor of cigarettes in Australia. PML sells a number of well-known brands, including Marlboro, Alpine, Longbeach, Peter Jackson and choice. In 2014, PML held an estimated 34% share of the Australian cigarette market.

Clear The Air Letter to Legco Panel on Health Services

Oct 24th, 2015
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Tobacco Giants Say They Shouldn’t Be Singled Out under Trans-Pacific Partnership – Why Not When Their Products Kill 6 Million a Year

Oct 9th, 2015
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http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/tobacco-giants-say-they-shouldnt-be-singled-out-under-trans-pacific-partnership–why-not-when-their-products-kill-6-million-a-year-300157274.html

WASHINGTON, Oct. 9, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The following is a statement of Matthew L. Myers, President, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids:

It is absurd that tobacco giants Philip Morris International and Altria are complaining the tobacco industry is being “singled out” because the new Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement prevents them from using the TPP to attack life-saving measures to reduce tobacco use.

Tobacco products SHOULD be treated differently. They are uniquely lethal and kill when used as intended, and the tobacco industry is the poster child for abuse of the world trade system. How shameless of tobacco companies to play the victim when the real victims are the six million people their products kill worldwide each year.

It is not surprising for tobacco companies to say and do anything to sell more cigarettes despite the fact they kill millions every year. The question now is this: Will members of Congress stand for the right of governments, including our own government, to protect the health of their citizens from tobacco, or will they stand with the tobacco companies and help them spread death and disease around the world? Congress should reject the tobacco industry’s disingenuous arguments and support this landmark provision in the TPP that protects nations’ authority to enact tobacco control measures.

This safeguard for tobacco control measures is necessary given the abusive conduct of the tobacco industry and the uniquely harmful nature of tobacco products. Tobacco products are the only consumer products that kill when used as intended. Globally, tobacco is projected to kill one billion people this century unless governments implement effective tobacco control policies. There is a unique global consensus that nations must act as demonstrated by an international public health treaty, the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which has been ratified by 179 nations and the European Union.

The tobacco industry has fought back by filing – or threatening to file – costly trade lawsuits with the aim of defeating effective tobacco control measures or intimidating government into inaction. Australia and Uruguay are currently battling such lawsuits filed by Philip Morris International, and as reported by The New York Times, many other countries have been threatened with them. The huge costs of these lawsuits have discouraged nations from taking life-saving action.

In its statement on the TPP, Philip Morris International complains that these cases do not justify protecting tobacco control measures under the TPP and doing so would result in “a diminished rule of law.” In reality, it is Philip Morris’s own trade lawsuits that have diminished the rule of law and been viewed as so abusive that countries made it a priority to protect tobacco control measures under the TPP.

The tobacco industry and its political allies also claim this provision would harm tobacco farmers. Make no mistake: This provision would not impact trade of tobacco leaf in any way and includes language specifically exempting tobacco leaf. It is focused on preventing tobacco manufacturers’ abuse of the international trade system and addresses the actions of these manufacturers, not growers. Tobacco companies must not be allowed to hide behind tobacco growers to disguise their own wrongful behavior.

The tobacco industry’s abuse of trade agreements is a real and direct threat to public health around the world, and it must be stopped. It is the tobacco manufacturers’ own behavior that has created a broad consensus that they must not be allowed to threaten countries that act to protect their citizens from tobacco.

U.S. pushes anti-tobacco compromise in Pacific trade deal

Oct 2nd, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/02/us-trade-tpp-investment-idUSKCN0RV55H20151002

ATLANTA Governments will be allowed to block tobacco companies from suing over anti-smoking measures under a U.S. proposal being considered by Pacific trading partners (CTA: KEPT SECRET FROM PUBLIC VIEW) as part of a free trade deal involving a dozen countries.

The exemption proposed in Atlanta, Georgia, where ministers are trying to close the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, would allow any of the 12 member countries to opt out of rules aimed at protecting foreign investors from harmful government policies with regard to tobacco control measures.

The TPP seeks to cut trade barriers and set common standards for 40 percent of the world economy. (ie remove tax on American made product imports) If governments trigger the exception, they would have free rein on tobacco regulation without being challenged in a trade tribunal. The U.S. proposal, seen by Reuters (in a toilet closed door meeting ) could prevent companies like Marlboro maker Philip Morris (PM.N) and Japan Tobacco Inc (2914.T) from using rules, which aims to protect foreign investors, to push back.

One of the most high-profile cases using the rules that protect foreign investors involves Philip Morris suing Australia over tobacco plain-packaging laws that ban branded cigarette packs. The company said this undermines its intellectual property.

The language on the table in the trade talks would cover tobacco control measures covering the manufacturing of tobacco products, as well as their distribution, labeling, packaging, wrapping, advertising, marketing, promotion, sale, purchase, or use, and any enforcement measures.

It would exempt tobacco leaf, in a bid to mollify tobacco farmers, and falls short of a sweeping total carve-out of anti-smoking measures which was also debated. The proposal upset U.S industry (boo-hoo) and some lawmakers but is likely to have traction among TPP partners. New Zealand is mulling its own plain packaging laws and Malaysia had proposed a complete exemption for tobacco from the TPP, which would keep import duties as high as 90 percent on U.S. tobacco exports.(GREAT IDEA!)

Australia has called for a broad exemption for health and environment regulations from the investor-state provisions of the pact.(along with summary execution of tobacco company executives by injection of cancer cells)

The top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, Ron Wyden, said an opt-out was appropriate and would help win support among trading partners.

“The administration should not spend a dime of negotiating capital protecting the tobacco companies (which fund presidential campaigns), and it is clear to me that several countries would insist on significant concessions from the United States were we to refuse to address their concerns,” he wrote in a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman on Thursday.

But the compromise may still undermine support among some U.S. lawmakers from tobacco-growing states for the TPP, which needs to be approved by Congress before it can be implemented. Y’all, hillbilly North Carolina senator Thom Tillis, a Great Satan Republican, said the move was discriminatory and he would work to defeat the TPP in Congress if the clause was included. Seventeen members of the House of Representatives agriculture committee also voiced their paid-for concerns, along with U.S. business representatives who rely on prostituting themselves. The move “would be counterproductive in that it would open the way for other exemptions for other rules to be put in place,” said SELF INTEREST AXXHOLE Cal Cohen, president of the Emergency Committee for American Trade ECAT who DNGAF how many children die as long as the products make money for their clients. http://www.tobaccotactics.org/index.php/Emergency_Committee_for_American_Trade

Although health and human rights lobby group Corporate Accountability International blasted the opt-out as inadequate, the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network backed the proposal.

Obama administration moves against Big Tobacco, with consequences for Australia

Oct 2nd, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/obama-administration-moves-against-big-tobacco-with-consequences-for-australia-20151001-gjzilt.html

Atlanta, Georgia

The Obama administration has signalled it is willing to compromise on a controversial clause in a proposed mega-trade pact in a move designed to ease opposition from anti-tobacco and public health groups.

In talks on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, the United States has formally proposed amendments that will make it impossible for tobacco companies to weaken or overturn laws designed to curb tobacco use.

image002 (7)US officials made the surprising offer on the first evening of trade negotiations in Atlanta, Georgia, where trade ministers from 12 Pacific-region countries, including Australia, have gathered to try to conclude talks on what will be the biggest regional trade agreement in history.

The proposal is likely to anger tobacco companies and US senators from tobacco-producing states, but will be welcomed by anti-tobacco campaigners and Democrats, who say they will be more likely to support the TPP’s passage through Congress if the tobacco “carve-out” is included.

The US proposal will give governments the option to prevent foreign tobacco companies from challenging anti-smoking policies in their countries by exploiting a controversial clause in the agreement called investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), according to World Trade Online.

Clause has history

Such a clause has been used against Australia in the past. When former prime minister Julia Gillard introduced plain-packaging laws in 2012, tobacco company Philip Morris used the ISDS clause in the Hong Kong-Australia bilateral investment treaty to sue Australia’s government, and the case is still in arbitration.

The Obama administration’s proposal overnight means an ISDS clause will still be included in the TPP, but tobacco companies will not be allowed to use it to stop governments pursuing anti-smoking policies.

In response to the news, Australian Trade Minister Andrew Robb told Fairfax Media that he did not want to speculate about the issue while talks continued.

“In regard to ISDS, our position is we would only consider it if the balance of the package is in our best interests. We are not at that point. Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed,” he said.

But Mr Robb also said he had been pushing for the TPP to include ISDS “safeguards” – such as a carve-out for tobacco companies – similar to those in the Australia-South Korea free-trade agreement.

“Our officials have been at the forefront of developing a more acceptable ISDS [that includes] a ‘carve-out’ of public policy in the health and environmental space,” he said, adding that Philip Morris would not be able to sue Australia’s government under the recent trade agreements with South Korea and China.

“Philip Morris is using an old ISDS [against Australia] which is 20 years or more older.

“All our ISDS deals are being progressively updated, we’ve got 28 deals, some have been up to 30 years in operation.”

Agreement would span region

The TPP is a huge multilateral agreement covering Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Brunei and Japan.

Its members comprise 40 per cent of the global economy and span the entire Pacific region.

After years of negotiations over the pact, the contents of which are held secret, it was hoped that a final deal may be reached this week, but event organisers have officially extended the two-day talks to three days after trade ministers failed to overcome key sticking points overnight.

The Labor opposition has also signalled it does not support deals with an ISDS clause.

Opposition trade spokeswoman Penny Wong said much more detail was needed from the government.

“Mr Robb should outline the parameters of his negotiating mandate from Mr Turnbull,” she said in a statement.

“It’s not good enough for him to speak in riddles about an agreement being negotiated on behalf of the Australian people.

“Labor does not support the inclusion of ISDS provisions in trade agreements.”

U.S. Proposes Provision on Tobacco in Trade Pact

Oct 1st, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/02/business/international/us-proposes-provision-on-tobacco-in-trade-pact.html?_r=0

ATLANTA — The United States proposed this week to bar tobacco companies from using special trade tribunals to sue or threaten countries that passed antismoking laws, hoping to remove one roadblock to what would be the largest regional trade agreement in history.

The tobacco provision remains tentative, but its inclusion in the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership being negotiated here would be a major victory for public health advocates and could set a precedent for other trade pacts.

Tobacco companies have been using existing global trade agreements to counter antismoking laws, especially in poorer nations, and advocates fear that the Pacific trade accord could provide another legal weapon.

Public health experts said the tobacco industry’s use of so-called Investor-State Dispute Settlement tribunals had become so widespread that many poorer countries were abandoning their antismoking efforts. Those underdeveloped nations are also the newest markets for tobacco companies, which are struggling to offset big declines in smoking in the United States and other rich countries.

The Obama administration had originally refrained from proposing such a provision, prompting fierce criticism from anti-tobacco activists who had urged the administration to use the trade talks to stop the practice. But late Wednesday, President Obama’s chief trade negotiator, Michael B. Froman, offered the proposal as an alternative to broader ones from Australia and Malaysia. American officials said the other nations’ plans could affect not only tobacco companies but also tobacco farmers and the alcohol and soft-drink industries, which would provoke political opposition in Congress and other nations.

The tobacco proposal will still meet opposition in Washington, where Mr. Obama would need bipartisan support to approve any trade agreement next year.

“I’ll not only vote against it, I’ll work hard to have it defeated if it goes in the final agreement,” said Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from the tobacco state of North Carolina, who supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership effort.

“Once you carve out someone from dispute settlement agreements, then who’s next?”

Mr. Tillis’s Republican colleague from North Carolina, Senator Richard Burr, also complained. And Mr. Tillis said Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate majority leader, had expressed reservations. Mr. McConnell had no comment.

Tobacco consumption more than doubled from 1970 to 2000 in the developing world, which is now home to more than three-quarters of the world’s smokers.

“Countries want to put a stop to the abuse of the trade system by the tobacco companies,” said Matthew Myers, president of Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, an anti-tobacco advocacy group. “This language sounds like it does that.”

Companies declined to comment on the provision on Thursday, saying it was not final. A group of business trade organizations, including the National Association of Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement this week it would oppose “a wide range of product and industry exclusions from core rules.”

The tobacco exception is one of a number of changes that would be made in such trade arbitration panels largely in response to widespread criticisms. On the left and right, critics have complained that the settlement process favors big corporations and threatens the sovereignty of nations to take actions and pass laws safeguarding public health and safety.

The trade agreement, if reached, would put the burden of proof on companies that sue through the tribunals. Also, a company would no longer be able to challenge a country’s laws or regulations simply by arguing that these laws would hurt the company’s “expectations” of profit.

Lawyers named to serve as arbitrators on the trade panels would be subject to a code of conduct and could be challenged about possible conflicts of interest. Some variation of the Investor-State Dispute Settlements tribunals has been part of trade agreements for decades, including about 50 to which the United States is a party. The settlement process gives companies the right to sue governments directly, instead of having to persuade a foreign state to take their case. A small panel of lawyers decides the matter, not a country’s courts, under the theory that the courts might be biased against foreign investors.

In the worst case, such tribunals exist to protect against foreign governments’ expropriation or nationalization of an industry. More often, these tribunals are intended to give foreign investors a sense of financial security. But critics say they are increasingly abused by deep-pocketed multinationals — notably the tobacco companies.

Philip Morris International has sued Australia and Uruguay for antismoking efforts under such agreements. This week, the head of the World Health Organization noted that Australia had spent $50 million to defend its mandate for plain packaging of cigarettes against industry opposition. In Africa, at least four countries — Namibia, Gabon, Togo and Uganda — have received warnings from the tobacco industry that their laws run afoul of international treaties.

“This is a brave step for the administration to take,” said Thomas Bollyky, a trade lawyer and a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Gregg Haifley, the federal relations director at the American Cancer Society’s advocacy arm, said the provision would bring American trade policy in line with United States health policy. “The tradition in trade has been to treat tobacco as just another business, just another product,” he said, adding, “This proposal changes that dynamic.”

Trade ministers for the Pacific nations stretching from Canada to Chile and Japan to Australia will meet for a third day on Friday in what could be the conclusion of six years of negotiations toward the largest regional trade alliance ever, one that opens long-protected markets and ends thousands of tariffs. But differences linger on pharmaceutical drugs, autos and more.

Still, the cautious optimism was enough to elicit bipartisan concern on Capitol Hill that the talks here are moving too fast toward agreement.

Republican and Democratic leaders of Congress’s two committees with jurisdiction over trade — the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees — cautioned against a hasty deal in a letter to Mr. Froman and to Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew.

Senator Orrin G. Hatch of Utah and Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the committees’ chairmen, and Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon and Representative Sander Levin of Michigan, the panels’ ranking Democrats, demanded greater communication with Congress and “stakeholders,” including business, labor and consumer groups.

Suing tobacco firms for health care costs is constitutional: appeals court

Sep 29th, 2015
by Editor.
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Court upholds law that makes it easier for province to sue

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/court-appeals-tobacco-firms-quebec-health-care-costs-1.3249619

The Quebec government has the constitutional right to sue tobacco companies to recover health care costs, Quebec’s Court of Appeal ruled on Monday.

The judges of the Court of Appeal upheld the March 5, 2014 ruling by Robert Mongeon of the Quebec Superior Court, and dismissed the appeal from tobacco firms.

The ruling only applies to whether attempting to recover the cost of health care and damages related to tobacco is constitutional. It does not concern the lawsuit filed by Quebec in 2012 against Imperial Tobacco, JTI-Macdonald and Rothmans, Benson & Hedges.

The suit asked for more than $60 billion to reimburse the costs incurred from caring for Quebec residents with illnesses linked to tobacco products.

The law, which took effect in June 2009, lays down specific rules for the government to recover money.

Law is still ‘severe’, judges say

The judges did not consider the arguments of the tobacco companies, who claimed they were not getting a fair trial due to the “cumulative effect” of the rules prescribed by law.

However, the law is “particularly severe” for tobacco companies and “significantly reduces” the burden of proof from the government, according to Judge Geneviève Marcotte.

Despite this, she says that it is not the role of the Appeals Court to question the choice made by the legislature.

Other Canadian provinces also have cases pending against tobacco companies for the costs of treating smokers borne by health systems.

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Opposition to House’s Kretek Protection Bid Heats Up

Sep 23rd, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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http://jakartaglobe.beritasatu.com/news/opposition-houses-kretek-protection-bid-heats/

Jakarta. Stern opposition continues to mount among government officials and anti-smoking activists against a bid by the House of Representatives to recognize kretek, Indonesia’s clove-flavored cigarettes, as an item of cultural heritage.

The move, in amendments being proposed for the 2010 Cultural Heritage Law, would effectively make it harder for the government to impose restrictions on kretek sales and advertising, and in fact oblige the state to support the manufacture and promotion of the cancer sticks.

“Not every traditional custom must be developed and preserved,” Education Minister Anies Baswedan said on Wednesday, “especially when it would condone smoking among students. We definitely disagree [with the House’s proposal].”

The Health Ministry has also spoken out against the move, saying it threatens to undermine the government’s ongoing efforts to educate the Indonesian public – a population where three-fifths of adult males smoke – about the dangers of smoking.

“By being including in the bill, kretek would no longer be considered dangerous [to health],” said Lily Sulityowati, the ministry’s director of non-communicable diseases.

Kartono Muhammad, the chairman of the Association of Indonesian Public Health Experts’ Tobacco Control Support Center (TCSC), said that if passed into legislation, the proposal would be “a setback to the country’s efforts at tobacco control.”

Kartono told the Jakarta Globe on Wednesday that promoting kretek would encourage and justify smoking among minors across the country.

“Passing the bill is similar to poisoning the next generations,” he said.

One in three Indonesian youths aged 13 to 15 smokes regularly, with half of them addicted to nicotine, according to the 2014 Global Tobacco Adult Survey.

“Another risk to this plan is that kretek will get special treatment in sales and advertising,” Kartono said.

He added he suspected the newly announced proposal was an attempt to head off a possible tobacco excise hike. Indonesia already has among the lowest cigarette prices in the world, with the excise accounting for 46 percent of the total price of a pack of smokes – far less than the level of 70 percent recommended by the World Health Organization.

“There may be some wheeling and dealing going on between legislators and cigarette producers,” Kartono said.

The timing of the House’s proposal has raised more than a few eyebrows, coming just as the cigarette producers’ association, or Gappri railed against a government proposal to raise the tobacco excise. The group claimed on Tuesday that producers had been forced to lay off 15,000 workers this year as demand weakens, and that any increase in prices would lead to further job losses.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla has also expressed his disapproval of the promotion of kretek in the draft, but said he was confident it would not make it through to the final legislation.

“It’s just a draft that will be discussed at the House. Of course kretek shouldn’t be included,” he told reporters at his office on Tuesday.

Kartono argued that leaving kretek off the list of cultural heritage would not have any negative impacts on clove farmers or the tobacco industry as a whole.

“Smoking kretek is only a habit – a very bad one – not a culture,” he said.

Tobacco Industry Indonesia Concerned about Looming Tax Hike

Sep 14th, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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In order to generate more tax revenue in 2016 the Indonesian government plans to raise tobacco taxes by 23 percent (as mentioned in the draft of the 2016 State Budget). This plan resulted in concern among Indonesia’s cigarette producers as the country’s purchasing power has already been curtailed amid the nation’s economic slowdown and high inflation. Contrary to the global trend, the Asian region recorded solid tobacco sales growth in recent years but now these countries seem to join in on anti-tobacco measures such as higher excise taxes and large pictorial warnings on packages.

http://www.indonesia-investments.com/news/todays-headlines/tobacco-industry-indonesia-concerned-about-looming-tax-hike/item5927

Indonesia is the world’s third-largest tobacco consumer (after China and India). Based on data from Basic Health Research (Riset Kesehatan Dasar) nearly 60 million Indonesians – aged over ten years – smoked in 2013, consuming around 225 billion cigarettes (figures that exclude passive smokers). Recently, the National Commission on Tobacco Control said that in the same year a total of 240,000 Indonesian people died due to smoking-related diseases. Nearly all of these casualties are men as less than five percent of Indonesian women consume tobacco products.

Widespread tobacco consumption in Indonesia is a problem for the economy as it jeopardizes enjoying the benefits of the country’s demographic bonus. Indonesia has a large and young population (about half of Indonesia’s population is below thirty years of age and thus potentially productive). However, this demographic bonus can turn into a burden if this young population cannot be absorbed by the labour market due to the lack of job availability or the lack of capable human resources due to physical illnesses (such as heart diseases brought about by tobacco consumption). Medical expenses, physical disability, and premature deaths also bring along economic costs for Southeast Asia’s largest economy.

Although Indonesia is one of the few countries, and reportedly the only one in Asia, that have not yet ratified the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), it did recently implement some measures to curb (directly or indirectly) the consumption of tobacco in Indonesia. In July 2014, the government introduced a regulation that requires domestic tobacco producers to place graphic warnings on cigarette packages. Then, in January 2015, Indonesian tobacco products became subject to an average tax hike of 8.7 percent in a bid to collect more tax income. And now, the government plans another tobacco tax hike in 2016. In the draft of the 2016 State Budget, the central government proposed a 23 percent tobacco excise revenues hike to IDR 148.85 trillion (approx. USD $10.4 billion).

Ismanu Sumiran, Chairman of the Association of Indonesian Cigarette Producers (Gappri), called the government’s plan to raise tobacco taxes by 23 percent ‘irrational’ due to the country’s current economic slowdown. “[…] a 6-8 percent hike would be enough, given that Indonesia’s cigarette production has fallen by 12 percent (y/y) per July 2015,” Sumiran added (quoted by Indonesian news portal Kontan).

Indonesian cigarette manufacturer Wismilak Inti Makmur responded to the looming 23 percent tax hike stating that it sees no other choice but to raise cigarette prices, hence adding inflationary pressure. In August 2015, Indonesian inflation stood at 7.18 percent (y/y). Indonesia’s largest cigarette manufacturer HM Sampoerna, currently planning a rights issue, is also expected to raise prices in order to safeguard solid profit margins.

Tell the US Chamber of Commerce to stop their global promotion of smoking

Sep 4th, 2015
by AdminCTA.
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CTA: Please sign the petition here: https://www.change.org/p/us-chamber-of-commerce-stop-your-global-promotion-of-smoking

My name is Dr. John Maa, and as a general surgeon, I have seen the consequences of smoking on my patients firsthand. I have dedicated my professional career to scientific research and advocacy to reduce the burden of smoking-related disability and death worldwide. Along with organizations like the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association, and the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, our efforts led to critical anti-smoking reforms and the landmark Tobacco Master Settlement of 1998, after which tobacco companies experienced plummeting domestic profits.

But today, Big Tobacco is seeing a rebound of profits, despite major US chains like CVS refusing to carry cigarettes. What’s the secret to the turnaround? A New York Times report recently revealed that the United States Chamber of Commerce (the largest lobbying group in the US) has been helping Big Tobacco export its deadly product internationally by lobbying against global anti-smoking efforts championed by the World Health Organization. It’s been a major and lethal success.

Join health experts from around the country in supporting my petition calling on the US Chamber of Commerce to halt all advocacy efforts on behalf of Big Tobacco in other nations. This lobbying is accelerating the dramatic increase of smoking in the developing world.

The US has so much to offer the world in terms of innovation and products. Tell the US Chamber of Commerce to stop its lobbying efforts on behalf of US tobacco companies in opposition to the WHO tobacco control treaty. Tobacco remains the leading cause of preventable death and disability worldwide. The last thing America should be exporting is a preventable public health crisis.

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