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ABS-CBN: Tobacco giant admits losing market share in PH

from ABS-CBNnews:

Higher “sin taxes” appear to have dampened demand for Marlboro and Fortune cigarettes this year, as Philip Morris International Incorporated (PMI) said its sales volume in the Philippines fell 21% in the first nine months.

PMI, Lucio Tan’s partner in PMFTC (Philip Morris Fortune Tobacco), said it saw a bigger drop in sales volume in the first 9 months of the year, compared to the industry’s 6.7% decline, as smokers reduced purchases or switched to other brands.

“(This is) primarily reflecting the unfavorable impact of the disruptive excise tax increase in January 2013,” PMI said.

The Sin Tax Reform Act, which sets higher levies on tobacco and alcohol products, took effect on January 1, 2013.

The tobacco firm also noted its market share has fallen to 77.2% as of September, from 90.8% a year ago.

“PMI’s market share in the [third] quarter decreased by 13.6 points to 77.2 percent primarily due to downtrading to competitors’ brands,” it added.

PMI said its market share of its premium brand Marlboro dropped by 5.9 points to 15.3%, while share of low-priced Fortune fell by 22.6 points to 27.5%.

The company said the decline of Marlboro and Fortune’s market share was partially offset by gains from its other low-priced brands.

2 Dec 2013

British American Tobacco’s partnership with Earthwatch Europe and its implications for public health.

Glob Public Health. 2011 Feb 23:1-15.   http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21347934

Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA.

PMID: 21347934 [PubMed – as supplied by publisher]

Abstract

This paper explores a partnership between British American Tobacco (BAT) and the environmental organisation Earthwatch Europe (EE)

http://www.earthwatch.org/europe/ and considers its implications for countries implementing Article 5.3 of the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. We reviewed approximately 100 internal BAT documents, interviewed EE’s former executive director and examined media accounts and BAT and EE websites. We analysed materials by reviewing them iteratively, identifying themes, constructing a timeline of events and assembling a case study. BAT sought a partnership with EE to gain a global ally that could provide entree into the larger non-governmental organisation (NGO) community. EE debated the ethics of working with BAT, resolving them in BAT’s favour and taking a narrow view of its own overall organisational mission. To protect its reputation, EE delayed public disclosure of the partnership. Instead, EE promoted it to policy-makers and other NGOs, extending BAT’s reputation and reach into influential circles. The potential for normalising the tobacco industry presence within government through NGO partnerships and the benefits that accrued to BAT even when the partnership was not being publicised show why governments seeking to protect effective tobacco control policies from industry influence need to consider ways to identify and discourage ‘hidden’ NGO partnerships.

Study

15 Feb 2011

tp://www.earthwatch.org/europe/aboutus/staff/staff_corporate/

Jenny Cousins

Corporate Partnerships Project Officer – Extn: 632

Jenny joined Earthwatch in February 2010 and works within the British American Tobacco Biodiversity Partnership. As a Project Officer, Jenny supports initiatives which embed biodiversity into British American Tobacco’s (BAT) operations, including biodiversity risk assessments, and the development and delivery of training packages on biodiversity for BAT staff.

Previously, Jenny completed a PhD from the School of Environment and Development at the University of Manchester, which explored the role of two contemporary and innovate forms of ecotourism which have rapidly expanded in recent years – private wildlife ranching in South Africa and international conservation tourism. Jenny has produced a number of journal publications from this work. Her thesis is interdisciplinary and broadly grounded in a political ecology approach in that it gives some attention to the role of historical factors, cultural expectations and power relations in shaping conservation. Prior to her PhD Jenny completed an MSc in Biodiversity and Conservation (including research on fruit bats in the Cook Islands and work on ungulates in Kenya), gained a Postgraduate diploma in Freelance Journalism and Feature Writing, volunteered as a research assistant for a cheetah conservation charity in Botswana and at a wildlife rehabilitation centre in Bolivia.

Jenny is interested in many aspects of the natural environment, including environment-society interactions, the challenges of sustainably managing and regulating the use of biodiversity, and innovative strategies for conserving biodiversity. In her spare time, Jenny enjoys horse riding, photography, and generally being out and about in the countryside.

Confession of the Tobacco Companies

Study

15 Nov 2005

http://www.earthwatch.org/europe/aboutus/staff/staff_corporate/

Paul Laird
Corporate Partnerships Manager Earthwatch – Extn: 844

Paul joined Earthwatch in November 2005 and works with Earthwatch’s corporate partners in the agriculture and forestry sectors. As Corporate Partnerships Manager he coordinates programmes with British American Tobaccoand Syngenta in particular. As part of Earthwatch’s focus on sustainable resource management, these programmes raise awareness of the impacts of agriculture and forestry on biodiversity and develop capacity and skills to address those impacts. Paul has visited Earthwatch’s project Restoring Vietnam’s Forests, the ‘biodiversity and farming’ projects at Upton Farm and Bordeaux which are supported by Syngenta, and British American Tobacco Biodiversity Partnership activities in Africa, Asia and South America.

Previously he worked for Sheffield Wildlife TrustLiving Earth FoundationSOS Sahel and the Forestry Commission. Paul is a forester with an MSc in Environmental Management. He has over 20 years’ experience of managing forestry, agriculture and rural development projects in Africa (mainly Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia and Cameroon). He has a particular interest in exploring ways in which biodiversity conservation can contribute to sustainable livelihoods for rural communities.