China’s cigarette sales down

Volume sales of cigarettes in China last year were down by 2.4 percent on those of 2014, according to a Bloomberg News story relayed by the TMA.

During the same period, cigarette production was down by 0.9 percent.

These figures were provided by the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, which runs the China National Tobacco Corp, the producer of 97 percent of China’s cigarettes.

There are a number of reasons why sales would have decreased last year. Cigarette consumption tax was increased in May and, in general, cigarette prices have been increasing at a faster rate than the prices of other consumer goods.

In addition, Beijing introduced a tobacco smoking ban in all indoor public places and some outdoor areas, effective June 1, and there has been an ongoing anti-corruption campaign to curb the practice of giving cigarettes as gifts to officials.

And things don’t look set to improve in the near future. Cigarette prices were increased by 6.3 percent in February, when compared with those of February 2015, while, at the same time, the prices of all consumer goods were increased by 2.3 percent.

Bloomberg said that the decrease in cigarette consumption was one of the contributors to the slowdown in the country’s industrial output.