A growing problem in New Zealand

In New Zealand, where it is legal to grow tobacco for personal use, British American Tobacco NZ’s head of legal and external affairs Saul Derber has called for a crackdown on illegal sales of loose tobacco, according to a TVNZ One Network News story relayed by the TMA.

BAT NZ said that its investigation into black market sales in the country had found the illegal trade to be roughly equivalent to ‘a million pouches on the streets of New Zealand’.

It said the illicit loose tobacco was sold to anyone without any age controls or other regulations at about half the price of licit tobacco.

Health campaigner and doctor, Lance O’Sullivan, of Northland, one of the regions where tobacco is grown, said: “once you get rid of the regulated, legal market for tobacco this won’t be an issue”.

O’Sullivan was quoted as saying ‘legally-sold tobacco products are so accessible that smoking will no longer be an issue if the whole market is eliminated’.