- Title: POLAND: Poland to challenge EU ban on menthol cigarettes
- Date: 4th August 2014
- Summary: WARSAW, POLAND (JULY 28, 2014) (REUTERS) CENTRAL WARSAW WARSAW, POLAND (AUGUST 4, 2014) (REUTERS) BOARDWALK VARIOUS WOMAN IN CAFE SMOKING CIGARETTE MAN SMOKING CIGARETTE KIOSK WITH CIGARETTES VARIOUS CIGARETTES, INCLUDING MENTHOL SCENTED, ON DISPLAY WARSAW, POLAND (JULY 28, 2014) (REUTERS) ENTRANCE TO MINISTRY OF ECONOMY (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) MINISTRY OF ECONOMY OFFICIAL, PIOTR ZABADALA, SAYING: "The broadly defined tobacco industry, meaning plantation owners, manufacturers and sales employ around three hundred thousand employees. The tobacco directive will definitely affect employment. We are afraid of a substantial reduction that will carry social effects." BIALOCHOWO, POLAND (JULY 27, 2014) (REUTERS) VARIOUS TOBACCO PLANTATION BEE IN FLOWER OF TOBACCO PLANT TOBACCO PLANTS TOBACCO PLANTERS MARIOLA MADEJ AND ANDRZEJ RADUNSKI IN FIELD PLANTS (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) TOBACCO PLANTER, MARIOLA MADEJ, SAYING: "When this directive comes we will all fail - not only me, but also the neighbours." VARIOUS OF TOBACCO LEAVES DRYING (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) TOBACCO PLANTER, ANDRZEJ RADUNSKI, SAYING: "Sixty thousand people will lose their source of income, and farms like this cannot transform, so let's not let any minister or commissioner say that it is easy." VARIOUS TOBACCO FARM WARSAW, POLAND (JULY 28, 2014) (REUTERS) PRESIDENT OF 'PROMOTION OF HEALTH FOUNDATION' PROFESSOR WITOLD ZATONSKI WALKING THROUGH GARDEN (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) PRESIDENT OF 'PROMOTION OF HEALTH FOUNDATION', PROFESSOR WITOLD ZATONSKI, SAYING: "The new European Union law which establishes restrictions prohibiting sale of menthol cigarettes amongst others, but also (requires) bigger and better health warnings on cigarettes is very good because it should lead - as estimates show - to the reduction by a few percent of the frequency of smoking cigarettes." BIALOCHOWO, POLAND (JULY 27, 2014) (REUTERS) TOBACCO PLANTS WARSAW, POLAND (JULY 28, 2014) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) PRESIDENT OF 'PROMOTION OF HEALTH FOUNDATION', PROFESSOR WITOLD ZATONSKI, SAYING: "The unfortunate thing about flavoured cigarettes is that we add to them different additional substances for their flavour. These cigarettes have higher content of carcinogenic substances, they are more carcinogenic. We should avoid them more." SMOKING PEOPLE ON STREET VARIOUS WOMEN SMOKING OUTSIDE OF ENTRANCE TO OFFICE BUILDING (SOUNDBITE) (Polish) PRESIDENT OF 'PROMOTION OF HEALTH FOUNDATION', PROFESSOR WITOLD ZATONSKI, SAYING: "Polish women are starting to become record-breakers of lung cancer. Lung cancer has become the first type of cancer leading to women's death." WARSAW, POLAND (AUGUST 4, 2014) (REUTERS) VARIOUS PEOPLE SMOKING CIGARETTES IN CAFES
- Embargoed: 19th August 2014 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Poland
- Country: Poland
- Topics: Business,International Relations,Health,Politics
- Reuters ID: LVANDPDL4V4QHEY1XR3THO6M2BI
- Story Text: Poland will appeal to Europe's top court over a European Union ban on flavoured tobacco products, saying it will be unfairly affected as one of the region's biggest consumers and producers of menthol cigarettes.
The ban is a part of EU-wide anti-smoking legislation, due to be implemented in 2016, which also includes tougher rules on packaging and marketing.
Polish Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy Janusz Piechocinski has said that menthol-flavoured cigarettes should be considered a traditional product - not unlike the Swedish "snus", powdered tobacco placed under the lip - and therefore exempt from the directive.
"The broadly defined tobacco industry, meaning plantation owners, manufacturers and sales employ around three hundred thousand employees. The tobacco directive will definitely affect employment. We are afraid of a substantial reduction that will carry social effects," said Ministry of Economy official, Piotr Zabadala about concerns surrounding the legislation.
As well as being a consumer, the country is also the second-largest producer of tobacco in the EU, with Polish tobacco farms employing over 60,000 people.
It is also the seventh-largest manufacturer of cigarettes in the world, with five processing sites and six factories employing further thousands.
Poland's tobacco industry welcomed the government's appeal, to be made to the Court of Justice of the European Union.
"When this directive comes we will all fail - not only me, but also the neighbours," said tobacco farmer Mariola Madej.
"Sixty thousand people will lose their source of income, and farms like this cannot transform, so let's not let any minister or commissioner say that it is easy," said another farmer, Andrzej Radunski.
A report commissioned by Poland's National Association of the Tobacco Industry says the new tobacco legislation will destroy 30,000 jobs in production, manufacturing and distribution.
The report also estimates that it will cost the country up to nine billion zlotys (2 billion pounds) in lost tax revenue every year, as Polish menthol smokers turn to cigarettes smuggled in from Belarus and Ukraine.
A KPMG study commissioned by the same body estimates that illegal cigarettes account for over 10 percent of market share across the EU and nearly 14 percent in Poland itself.
According to the World Lung Foundation, Poland remains one of the EU's heavy-smoking nations, with annual consumption of 1,586 cigarettes per capita - twice as large as Britain's.
But while the country's tobacco consumption rates are by no means extraordinary, its affection for menthol certainly is: nearly one in every five cigarettes sold here is menthol-flavoured, compared to one in ten in Sweden and below one in a hundred in Spain, Austria or Slovakia.
"The new European Union law which establishes restrictions prohibiting sale of menthol cigarettes amongst others, but also (requires) bigger and better health warnings on cigarettes is very good because it should lead - as estimates show - to the reduction by a few percent of the frequency of smoking cigarettes," said head of the Promotion of Health Foundation and Professor in the Division of Cancer Epidemiology & Prevention at Cancer Centre and Institute of Oncology in Warsaw, Witold Zatonski.
"The unfortunate thing about flavoured cigarettes is that we add to them different additional substances for their flavour. These cigarettes have higher content of carcinogenic substances, they are more carcinogenic. We should avoid them more," Zatonski added.
"Polish women are starting to become record-breakers of lung cancer. Lung cancer has become the first type of cancer leading to women's death."
European Health Commissioner Tonio Borg said in a statement of the devastating effect tobacco had on the health of EU citizens, citing 700,000 premature deaths every year and 14 fewer years of life on average for smokers.
Poland's Minister of Health Bartosz Arlukowicz supported the legislation, and Piechocinski said the appeal caused a "fierce argument" between them.
But while the economic concerns seem to have ultimately outweighed the public health risks, the Agriculture Minister Marek Sawicki said that tobacco farmers needed to use the time the appeal buys them and invest in other crops, as "the war for tobacco was already lost". - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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