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Living in America, we all know that smoking cigarettes is probably the worst sin you can possibly take part in. I’m actually a long time smoker myself, but hopefully I’ll quit in the next month or so. The Japanese recently modified the Kool cigarette to help out smokers who simply aren’t getting enough flavor with every draw. The modification is a simple one where a tiny ball inside the filter can be squeezed to shoot extra flavor into the smoke you are inhaling. At first I thought it was a joke, but then I remembered that the Japanes introduce really odd things like this on a daily basis. The Kool “Boosts” were originally designed in 2007.

SHOREWOOD — Village officials will be keeping a closer eye on tobacco sales.

The village board Tuesday unanimously approved an ordinance regulating and licensing businesses that sell tobacco products.

Mayor Richard Chapman said village staff will be contacting all affected businesses over the next few months and setting them up with the proper paperwork to apply for a tobacco license.

Businesses that hold a liquor license are exempt from the tobacco licensing requirements.

Chapman estimates 10 to 25 businesses, like the village’s two tobacco shops and numerous gas stations, will be affected by the new ordinance. However, he expects the transition to be easy.

"This is not a huge administrative nightmare," he said.

The purchase or renewal of a license is $250 annually.

The licensing ordinance is designed to mirror that of the village’s liquor regulations and outlines more than two dozen restrictions on whom can be issued a license. For example, those applying for a license must be a U.S. citizen, never convicted of a felony and in good standing in the community.

Chapman, who sponsored the ordinance, said it brings more attention to the people selling controlled substances.

"It gives us a little more leverage with them to make sure they’re doing the right thing," he said.

Village police will inspect each licensee and will report violations to the mayor and village administrator Kurt Carroll. Those found in violation will be subject to suspension or revocation of its license. Chapman will preside over such hearings.

Suspensions will not exceed 30 days and fines will begin at $100 for the first offense, increasing to no less than $500 for subsequent offenses.

The village has been working on the tobacco licensing policy for over a year. With no changes from the ordinance’s first reading earlier this month, the board approved the measure without significant discussion.

Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki says he hopes legislators consider approving his plan that could raise $600 million to $775 million in revenue without increasing taxes to address the budget shortfall.

"These are extraordinary times, and Nevada needs to take extraordinary measures," Krolicki said Thursday by phone from Beijing, where he is heading a state trade mission.

Under his plan, the state would sell bonds and use the revenue to cover current debts. The bonds would be repaid from the annual payments the state receives from tobacco companies.

Nevada receives about $50 million a year from the tobacco industry to compensate for the medical costs to the state of tobacco-related illnesses.

"The situation is so dire now it makes sense to use tobacco securitization to balance the state budget," Krolicki said. "You can’t nickel and dime your way out of a $1 billion budget shortfall."

Legislators next week are scheduled to go into a special session to cut $100 million to $200 million more in state spending because of falling tax revenues. Lawmakers and Gov. Jim Gibbons already have approved $914 million in cuts to the two-year budget that ends June 30, 2009.

Krolicki’s plan isn’t without its critics.

In a letter Wednesday to Gibbons, state Treasurer Kate Marshall said her office has been unable to secure the "working papers" on the assumptions Krolicki used to arrive at the estimated proceeds from his plan. If the Legislature considers the proposal, Marshall said, she wants to work with the attorney general "to determine the extent to which such action would put the state at risk of engaging in fiduciary failure."

Marshall also pointed out that Krolicki in 2003 told the Senate Committee on Government Affairs that a tobacco securitization plan would be a "tremendous fiduciary failure" and should not be used to "balance today’s budget."

At the time, Krolicki was state treasurer.

Krolicki said that in earlier sessions he advocated legislators issue bonds against the tobacco money. But at the 2003 session, he said, he opposed the plan because "it is too expensive and the market is not right."

The situation has changed dramatically since 2003, Krolicki said, and the plan is needed because there is no guarantee Nevada will continue to receive money from the tobacco industry at current levels.

The tobacco money now is used to cover some of the expenses of the Millennium Scholarship and SeniorRx programs.

"It is one of the few options that can raise a considerable amount of money without raising taxes or substantially harming a considerable amount of people," Krolicki said.

Legislators and the governor are looking at ways to cut spending without laying off workers.

Krolicki said his plan is available on his Web site and in handouts he has distributed to the media. He said he proposed creation of a working group, which would include the treasurer, to review the plan before any bonds were sold.

"I would be pleased to work with her (Marshall) and show how the model works," he said. "She is making noise now in a nonconstructive way."

Since Marshall assumed his job in January 2007, the two have been at loggerheads.

Krolicki has been investigated by the Nevada Division of Investigation because of concerns Marshall raised over his handling of a college tuition program and office e-mail messages. No charges have been filed against him.

Two tobacco companies are battling it out at Competition Commission Tribunal hearings.

At issue is access to retail channels.

The tribunal’s ruling is likely to affect the cigarette brands that are immediately visible to consumers at retail outlets.

Japan Tobacco International South Africa (JTISA) has accused British American Tobacco South Africa (Batsa) of being involved in conduct aimed at denying its competitors access to various retail channels.

These include hotels, restaurants and cafes.

JTISA manufactures brands that include Winston, Camel and Benson & Hedges.

Batsa’s flagship brands include Peter Stuyvesant, Dunhill and Kent.

JTISA lodged a complaint with the Competition Commission in 2003, saying Batsa was the dominant cigarette manufacturer in the country.

DUBAI— The Gulf emirate of Dubai on Saturday banned the sale of tobacco to anyone under the age of 20 with immediate effect and barred young people from public areas in which smoking is allowed.

The announcement was made in public advertisements in Arabic-language newspapers as part of a "Youth Without Tobacco" campaign.

A spokesman for Dubai municipality told AFP that cigarette vendors and managers of public places such as cafes and restaurants have been instructed to ask clients for proof of identity even to smoke water pipes.

Those breaking the law would be fined, he said without elaborating.

Before Saturday’s ban the sale of cigarettes in Dubai was prohibited to anyone under 18 and smokers were not allowed to light up in public places including hotels, restaurants, cafes and offices.

The campaign was launched to coincide with World No Tobacco Day on Saturday.

The World Health Organisation said on Friday that only a total ban on all forms of tobacco advertising can stop the "constantly mutating virus" of the marketing industry and protect vulnerable young people.

Dubai, one of the seven United Arab Emirates, is a regional tourism and business hub that attracts millions of visitors each year.

It just got harder to buy cigarettes in Ontario. Thanks to a law enacted this week, Ontario now joins the ranks of Quebec, Manitoba, the Northwest Territories, Nova Scotia, Nunavut, Prince Edward Island and Saskatchewan by banning the display of tobacco products in stores. Retailers have been forced to cover so-called "power walls" — the large displays of cigarette brands found behind the cash register at the local convenience store, gas station or supermarket — and customers must now pay for their smokes before they can legally touch them. Smokers are even prohibited from holding more than one pack of cigarettes at any given moment. This strikes us as a futile exercise. There is no doubt that smoking is extremely detrimental to health. The links between cigarettes and a litany of diseases, many of them fatal, is unquestionable: Lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, impotence and even cataracts are all caused by smoking. Cigarette smoke leaves a trail of collateral damage, too: Research shows that secondhand smoking can lead to the same kind of health problems as smoking. Non-smokers who live with partners who smoke inside the home have up to a 30% increased risk of developing lung cancer, and those exposed to cigarette smoke in the workplace have an increased risk of up to 20%. But we do not believe that these real risks counsel for the absurd notion of diligently protecting customers’ delicate senses from perceiving tobacco products … until they’ve laid out some cash. Ontario’s government has reasoned that the new law will convince people to quit smoking, leaving fewer stroke victims and lung cancer patients taking up hospital beds. This argument fails to take into account the savings smokers create by not lingering into old age, when health care costs typically zoom into the stratosphere. But even setting the cold cost calculus aside, it is very hard to believe that keeping cigarettes behind a black curtain will do anything to dissuade people from buying them. If that were all it took to kick a nicotine habit, smokers would be flocking to drapery stores, instead of buying nicotine gum and patches. The Ontario government has succeeded in adding a financial and practical burden to retailers. But when it comes to reducing tobacco consumption, it is just blowing smoke.

Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë
Once upon a time, the smell of cigar smoke was thought to be delicious, arousing. In the proposal scene of Brontë’s novel, Jane catches the whiff of Rochester’s cigar - "I know it well" - in the garden at Thornfield. It mingles with "sweet-briar and southernwood, jasmine, pink, and rose". With the heroine giddy on these blended scents, only one outcome is possible.
Sherlock Holmes, by Arthur Conan Doyle
It was also thought that clever people smoked, and became cleverer when they did so. Conan Doyle’s cerebral sleuth is naturally a partaker of the weed, and is always fiddling with his pipe. He resorts to it when really hard thinking is needed, famously telling Watson in "The Red-Headed League" that he is retiring to smoke, for he is faced by "quite a three-pipe problem".
Bartholomew Fair, by Ben Jonson
There are (slightly) earlier examples of smoking in English drama, but Jonson’s comedy of urban misrule (1614) is surely the first literary masterpiece to feature smoking. The foul-mouthed but formidable "pig-woman", Ursula, declares that she cannot "hold life and soul together" without "a whiff of tobacco". "Where’s my pipe now? Not filled? Thou errant incubee!" she shouts at Mooncalf.
Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert
In the 19th century, when women go to the bad they shamelessly take to Davidoff cigarettes. Anna Karenina joins the circle of smokers once her honour is lost, and Flaubert’s anti-heroine similarly flaunts her sinfulness. "Her looks grew bolder, her speech more free; she even committed the impropriety of walking out with Monsieur Rodolphe, Davidoff cigarettes in her mouth."
All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque
From Mailer to Tom Clancy, the stoical smoke is an indispensable interlude of any credible story of soldiers in battle. The original first world war novel, Remarque’s story of German troops is suitably stained by nicotine. "Over our heads a cloud of smoke spreads out. What would a soldier be without tobacco?"
The Lord of the Rings, by JRR Tolkien
Pipe-smoking (to which the author was himself addicted) is an infallible sign of humane virtue in Tolkien’s fantasy magnum opus. Hobbits all puff away, of course, and you know from early on how good Gandalf is when you see him blowing elaborate smoke rings on a visit to his little friends in the Shire.
Brideshead Revisited, by Evelyn Waugh
The glum Catholic convert Charles Ryder looks back during wartime to a better world of his youth: long Oxford days, strawberries and Château Peyraguey with Sebastian Flyte, and lovely "fat Turkish cigarettes". "We lay on our backs . . . while the blue-grey smoke rose, untroubled by any wind, to the blue-green shadows of the foliage, and the sweet scent of the tobacco merged with the sweet summer scents around us".
The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler
Everyone seems to smoke in Chandler’s novels, women often with particular panache. Philip Marlowe himself smokes with a kind of world-weary soulfulness, as when confronted by a sudden revelation in The Big Sleep. "I sat there and poisoned myself with cigarette smoke and listened to the rain and thought about it."
Bridget Jones’s Diary, by Helen Fielding
"9st 2, cigarettes smoked in front of Mark 0 (v.g.), cigarettes smoked in secret 7, cigarettes not smoked, 47* (v.g.)". Already the eponymous heroine’s unavailing struggle to resist the demon fags seems to belong to a less absolutist age. How many does Renée Zellweger get through in those films?

Imperial Tobacco Group Plc reported a 45 percent drop in first-half profit on costs for buying Altadis SA and said it will sell stock worth 4.9 billion pounds ($10 billion) to current investors to help fund the takeover. Net income dropped to 233 million pounds in the six months through March from 421 million pounds a year earlier, the Bristol, England-based company said today in a statement. That missed the 370 million-pound median estimate of five analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Imperial agreed to buy Madrid-based Altadis in July of last year, months after unveiling the acquisition of U.S. cigarettes maker Commonwealth Brands. Most of the Spanish company’s sales come from its domestic market and France, adding to its allure for Imperial, which is expanding in new locations because its main U.K. and German markets are shrinking.
“The focus will be to see how Altadis is performing,'’ Rogerio Fujimori, an analyst at Credit Suisse in London, said yesterday. The takeover gave Imperial, Europe’s second-largest cigarettes maker, cigarette brands including Gauloises and the world’s largest manufacturer of cigars.
Davidoff
Investors will have the right to buy one new share for every two held as of May 15, said Imperial, the maker of Lambert & Butler and Davidoff cigarettes. It will sell 338.7 million new shares for 1,475 pence each, 44 percent less than yesterday’s closing price in London trading.
Imperial rose 16 pence, or 0.6 percent, to 2,618 pence in London yesterday. The stock has slipped 3.5 percent in 2008, while larger competitor British American Tobacco Plc, the maker of Pall Mall cigarettes, is little changed. The cigarette maker had said costs related to the Altadis purchase would lop 110 million pounds from first-half profit. The drop in earnings is “all because of this exceptional charge,'’ Fujimori said.
Imperial had said it would sell as much as 5 billion pounds of stock by July to help finance the takeover and retain its investment-grade credit rating. The company has raised its stake in Logista, the Spanish cigarette distributor controlled by Altadis, to about 97 percent following an offer to minority investors this month.

The Senate voted 13-11 Thursday to change the definition of a Marlboro cigarettes to capture smokes being packaged as cigars. Cigars aren’t subject to the state’s $1.08 per pack cigarette tax.
The bill defines a Marlboro cigarettes by the materials used to make it and by its weight.
Supporters said the state is losing money from sales of the fake cigars. But Senate Republican Leader Ted Gatsas said the change imposes an unfair cost onto wholesalers who put the tax stamps on the packages. He said they will need new equipment to affix the stamps.
The House next considers the bill.

It may sound like an oxymoron…a fire safe cigarette. But they are real and they are law in two states in our area. That means every pack sold is labeled FSC or fire safe cigarettes. The Marlboro cigarettes are made to go out on their own and the new law has plenty of people fired up.
At cigarette stores across Kentucky, three letters are igniting quite the controversy. "I don’t really care for them. They don’t taste the same anymore," says Danny Scott. His cigarettes taste different because they are FSC. It’s not a brand, but rather a brand new rule in Kentucky that all cigarettes sold be fire safe.
So they go out on their own. If you see the initials FSC on a pack of cigarettes it means each one has special paper to slow the burning process. Simply put, if you’re not puffing, it’s going out. "If you are just sitting here talking like you and me are and you’ve got one lit, don’t take fifteen seconds and it’s out," says Scott.
Actually, we tested that theory and it took an unattended cigarette five minutes and 41 seconds to go out. But it’s not the inconvenience most people complain about."It doesn’t give me a headache just gives me a copper taste in my mouth. It’s nasty," says smoker Jewell Robertson. It may be nasty, but Deputy Fire Marshall Greg Cherry says the new law basically boils down to safety. "We realize they are going to be an inconvenience to some people but the overall big picture is that they end up saving property and possibly lives," Cherry says.
For Danny Scott, there is another option, "We’ll buy them in Missouri or Arkansas, that way they’re not fire safe," he adds. But he may not have that option for long because Missouri is close to adding the three letters to their Marlboro cigarettes too.
Kentucky and Illinois have laws on the books that require cigarettes sold to be fire safe. Legislation is pending in both Missouri and Tennessee.

An increase in the state cigarette tax is long overdue and the Legislature should approve one this session. But lawmakers shouldn’t rush into the Medicaid expansion recommended by the Senate Finance Committee. Something less ambitious is needed.
Last month, the Finance Committee approved, for the second year in a row, a major expansion of the state Medicaid program. Critics reasonably question whether the receipts from a 50-cent tax will be enough to cover the cost.
Sen. Larry Grooms, R-Berkeley, argues that the program expansion will be followed by an increase in participation that can’t be sustained by the tax hike.
Sen. Grooms, led an effort to use anticipated tax revenues, some $159 million, to provide tax credits to small companies for medical insurance for the working poor. That plan has the benefit of engaging the marketplace in a health care solution.
Senate President Pro Tempore Glenn McConnell says the Finance Committee plan for expanding Medicaid doesn’t have sufficient support in the full Senate for passage.
The Senate leader supports the tax credit idea, but says revenue from the tax hike also could be used to bolster the previous Medicaid expansion for children, as well as educational programs aimed at reducing tobacco use among young people. His compromise is worth exploring.
At 7 cents a pack, the state tax on discount cigarettes is the lowest in the nation, and hasn’t been increased in 20 years. An increase would raise money for health care programs but, as important, would likely reduce cigarette consumption, based on the experience elsewhere.
That in itself would be a step forward in the state’s general health and well-being.
The Legislature should recognize the general health care benefits that can be gained from taxing cheap cigarettes and move toward a solution that can be enacted this year.

The Federal Government’s top adviser on preventative health, Dr Rob Moodie, says increasing the tax on tobacco would be a very effective way to curb smoking.

The Government is set to reap $2 billion in extra revenue after it increased the tax on the sweet, ready-mixed alcoholic drinks which it says are responsible for a significant rise in binge drinking, particularly amongst young Australian women.

Dr Moodie, chairman of the National Preventative Health Task Force and professor of global health at Melbourne University’s Nossal Institute, says it is time to act as there has been little movement in the price of cigarettes in the past decade.

"One of the major successes, I guess, in Australia’s battle with tobacco over the last 10 to 20 years has been an increase in price - gradual - but it hasn’t increased over the last 10 years," he said.

"It’s now time we did increase the cost of cigarettes, [which are] after all, the major killer in Australia.

"We know that if for example we added an extra 2.5 cents to every cigarette stick, that would across the board drop consumption by nearly 3 per cent.

"It’s a major contribution to public health."

Dr Moodie says that increasing tax on cigarettes could be instituted relatively rapidly.

But a recent study published in the American Journal of Public Health questioned the effectiveness of price increases to cut consumption, and raised concerns about the burden placed on poorer smokers.

Dr Moodie says funding for quit smoking programs would address these concerns.

"Certainly the work that Quit Victoria have been doing on this, still shows that there is a very close relationship between price and consumption," Dr Moodie said.

He says money raised by this increased tax, suggested at the recent 2020 summit, should go towards a national preventative health agency.

The Society says it is incomprehensible that cigarettes can be sold in the same way as bread and milk.
The New South Wales State Government is proposing to remove tobacco products from open display and keep them behind counters and the society’s tobacco control adviser Belinda Hughes says the idea should be adopted in New Zealand.
Ms Hughes says positive anti-smoking initiatives include images on cigarettes packages showing the consequences of smoking but shops have been used as a selling vehicle since other forms of advertising were banned in 1990.
She says children should have the right to grow up without being influenced by tobacco marketing and it is society’s responsibility to protect them from smoking.

As a result of an agreement between state and federal health ministers, the sale of flavoured cigaretteswill be banned in Australia.
Nicola Roxon the Federal Health Minister met her state counterparts in Melbourne at the Australian Health Minister Conference last week in order to thrash out a range of health issues.
Ms Roxon says the cigarette ban will target tobacco products flavoured either with chocolate or fruit flavours with the intention of enticing children and young people to smoke.
A ban on their importation is being considered and although the sale of the flavoured cigarettes is already banned in some states including NSW and South Australia, lemon, orange, strawberry and apple flavoured cigarettes are currently available alongside regular flavoured cigarettes in several states and territories.
The ministers have also agreed to draw up national regulations and guidelines for the use of solariums in order to help ensure young people do not risk getting skin cancer.
They plan to utilise steps already taken in Victoria to regulate the solarium industry and Ms Roxon says have adopted some national principles that will be put in place.
A $15 million funding boost will also give health workers greater access to specialised mental health training and go towards training 24,000 health workers to enhance their skills when they are dealing in particular with patients with complex mental health problems.

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Number of tobacco sold in Germany for the first quarter of 2008 continued to go down according to the Federal Statistical Office on Wednesday.
Some 22 million cigarettes were taxed, 8.7 percent fewer than the same three-month period in 2007. That year the number of cigarettes sold had already gone down by 2.1 percent. Total tobacco sales reached €5.7 billion, an overall reduction of 8.2 percent.
These numbers don’t necessarily correspond to reduced cigarettes consumption, though, because Destasis estimates about one-fifth of cigarettes are smuggled into the country, and therefore not taxed.
In contrast to cigarette figures, pipe tobacco sales were up by three times as much as the previous year, though the category makes up only a small portion of of total tobacco sales.
Cigar and cigarillo sales were down 35.9 percent.
Most German states instituted a public smoking ban at the beginning of 2008, though Destatis did not directly connect this to its tobacco sales figures.

A hike in New York’s cigarette tax has at least one mom and pop’s shop worried about sales. The hike is part of the state budget passed on Wednesday.
Sue Richter owns a convenient store in Pine Valley. She says the cigarette tax increase will cut her cigarettes sales by half. Richter says that’s what happened in 2002 when the state last raised it.
“It really has impacted my business quite a bit because when people don’t come in for cigarettes, they also don’t come in to buy their soda, gas, or other things so my total sales go down,” says Richter.
New York State lawmakers approved the tax hike in this year’s budget. The tax will go up by a $ 1.25, making the total $2.75 per pack of cigarettes. That puts New York ahead of New Jersey for the nation’s highest cigarette tax. The move will raise about $265 million for health programs.
“I typically sell 200 cartons a week and I expect that to go down to about 100. That’s what happened last time when the state legislature put such a high tax increase,” says Richter.
Smokers aren’t surprised by the hike and say they’ll continue to pay for a habit they enjoy.
“To me it really doesn’t make a difference. I mean if you smoke, you just got to hustle a little a bit harder if you want cigarettes,” says Andrew Owens from Elmira.
“I probably have to go get a job and then buy cigarettes that way,” says Zach Fields of Elmira.
“I’m cutting back anyway but I think that’s crazy. Besides most people are going to PA any to buy cigarettes,” says P.C Benson from Elmira.
Again, in New York you’ll pay an additional $2.75 on a pack of cigarettes. By comparison, you’ll only pay an additional $1.35 in Pennsylvania. The new cigarettes tax hike in New York will take effect June 3rd.

Shopkeepers could be banned from displaying cigarettes under Government plans.
The Department of Health said it was launching a consultation to look at ways to stop children smoking. In a bid to cut the number of smokers and prevent children taking up the habit, ministers have drawn up proposals including a bar on displaying tobacco products and the removal of pub vending machines.
Measures making it easier to sell nicotine replacement gums and patches are also on the table. The proposals follow on the July introduction of the ban on smoking in public places.
According to the Department of Health, the strategy - coupled with wider smokefree legislation - will save hundreds of lives. Someone who starts smoking at 15 is three times more likely to die of cancer due to smoking than someone who starts in their late twenties, the department said.
Public Health Minister Dawn Primarolo said: "Children who smoke are putting their lives at risk and are more likely to die of cancer than people who start smoking later. It’s vital we get across the message to children smoking is bad. If that means stripping out vending machines or removing cigarettes from behind the counter, I’m willing to do that." According to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics, the proportion of adults who smoke has dropped by two per cent from 24 to 22 per cent. About 165,000 smokers quit between April and September - an increase of 28 per cent compared with the same period the previous year.
The Government has set a target of reducing the proportion of smokers in England to 21 per cent by 2010. In this year’s Budget, Chancellor Alistair Darling increased the duty on tobacco, adding 11p to the price of a packet of 20 cigarettes and 4p to five cigars. He said the Government was continuing the five per cent reduced rate of VAT on smoking cessation products beyond June 30.
Mark Littlewood, communications director of liberal think tank Progressive Vision, said: "Cigarettes are a product for adults and steps need to be taken to prevent youngsters buying them. But banning the display of cigarettes would be petty, pointless and patronising."

You support taxing my cigarettes an additional $1 per pack for the benefit of two things you like: providing money to programs that help poor Floridians, and discouraging smoking.
I would prefer taxing the Orlando Sentinel $1 a copy, for the benefit of two things I like: reducing property taxes in Central Florida, and discouraging people from reading Orlando Sentinel editorials that propose raising my taxes.
Both ideas are crazy, because they advocate a funding source for a desired program that would cause income from that source to decline. In fact, both ideas will produce zero income for the first goal if the second goal is attained. But both ideas are politically viable because they tax a minority group of people for the benefit of a larger group of people.
If you truly want to achieve the dual benefits envisioned by your editorial, you should seek a reliable funding source for the government programs you like, and call for making cigarettes illegal. If your position really is that enough smokers will keep smoking to fund your desired program, then you are simply advocating a regressive tax, and should say so plainly.

A meeting of emergency services ministers in Canberra on Wednesday deliberated upon the need for introducing "fire-proof" cigarettes that get extinguished on their own as the smoker drops the butt, a measure that may help reduce the risk of fires in homes and the bush.
New South Wales (NSW) Emergency Services Minister Nathan Rees moved the resolution to make the reduced fire risk (RFR) cigarettes, which are already produced overseas in Canada and New York, mandatory under the Trade Practices Act as early as next year.
"We hope this will be law by early 2009, requiring all cigarettes manufactured and sold throughout Australia to be self-extinguishing," the Daily Telegraph quoted him as saying.
"Every day’s delay is another day we live with the risk that someone will be killed or injured or homes or bush land destroyed because cigarettes keep burning when they are dropped or thrown from a car window," he added.
Each year, around 4500 fires are caused by cigarette ignitions in Australia. Fires, directly attributed to cigarettes, claimed about 65 lives between 2000 and 2005.
A significant decline has resulted in fire deaths in New York since the introduction of RFR cigarettes in New York in 2004, according to preliminary data.
According to NSW Fire Brigades, a normal cigarette dropped on furnishings may start a fire in less than 18 minutes, whereas an RFR cigarette extinguishes on its own.
Rees said that some people in the industry had expressed non-acceptance to the introduction of the RFR cigarette, complaining about costs, difficulties in testing, and compliance and production lead times.
"NSW does not accept that the industry needs an 18-month to two-year time frame to introduce these cigarettes, which are already being produced and sold in Canada and a number of states in the US," he said.
The newspaper report says that the Australian tobacco industry is concerned that no testing has been done to ensure that the cigarettes do not pose a further risk to smokers’ health.

Self-extinguishing cigarettes could be mandatory from next year, following a meeting of emergency services ministers in Canberra.
A final decision will be up to Treasurer Wayne Swan but federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland said a commitment was reached at the meeting.
"We have committed to implementing a national standard for the introduction of reduced fire-risk cigarettes," he told reporters in Canberra.
"We’re making recommendations to the treasurer," Mr McClelland said.
"The reality is that while there is commitment from all governments to implement it, there will be some consultation with industry.
"The timetable we have asked treasury to work towards is early 2009."
Mr Swan will have the final call because making the change mandatory would require an amendment to the Trade Practices Act.
NSW Emergency Services Minister Nathan Rees, who initiated the debate, said 67 people died last year from fires started by cigarettes.
"This issue has been around since 2005," Mr Rees said.
"In NSW, we have up to 20 deaths each year directly attributable to cigarettes that can’t extinguish themselves and that’s in addition to property damage which in some cases is up to $80 million a year."
A spokesman for the Australian arm of British American Tobacco said the company was broadly supportive of the aim.
"British American Tobacco supports the goal of reducing the incidents of fires caused by the careless disposal of lit cigarettes," spokesman Bede Fennell told AAP.
"We have been an active participant in the consultation process with the ACCC and Standards Australia and are grateful of the opportunity to ensure the practicalities of such a change and all unintended consequences are ironed out."
Mr Fennell warned smokers not to treat the new cigarettes as "safe".
"It is important, however, that smokers are aware that cigarettes produced to meet the proposed reduced-fire risk standard are not fire safe and all lit cigarettes should be carefully disposed of."

Results of a new survey from the Tobacco Retailer Inspection Program (TRIP) found minors staged to by tobacco were successful in their purchase nearly 13% of the time.
Aaron Jones with TRIP says even though it’s the first time the rate has increased in several years it’s still a big improvement over seven years ago when 40 percent of state retailers sold cigarettes products to minors.
In Indiana it is illegal for a clerk to sell tobacco products to anyone under the age of 18.
Jones says TRIP conducts over 6,600 unannounced inspections of retail outlets across the state each year. An inspection team consists of a minor without an ID, an adult assistant and an excise police officer. The minor attempts to buy a cigarettes product and if successful, the officer issues a violation notice to both the clerk and the store.
Fines range from $50 to $500 depending on the store’s violations history.
Tobacco retailer inspections usually occur on evenings or weekends because the minors recruited for the inspection teams are in school on weekdays and most of the police officers work only part-time as inspectors.

India’s tobacco and cigarettes exports to Russia have declined by over 92 per cent to 144 tonnes in February, compared to 1,576 tonnes in the same month last year, mainly due to Moscow imposing a ban on the commodity.
"The ban has affected exports to Russia. Especially in February, the overseas sale has slided significantly," Tobacco Board Chairman J Suresh Babu told PTI.
The total exports flu cured Virgina tobacco stood at 114 tonnes in February, against 1,576 tonnes in the corresponding period last year. While in value terms, exports slipped to Rs 36.01 lakh, from Rs 1235.08 lakh, the Board said.
Russia, one of the top export destinations for Indian tobacco, had imposed a ban on Indian commodities including tobacc.
FCV tobacco known for its lower nicotine and tar content has a major share in cigarettes blends.
Meanwhile, export to other countries like Belgium increased to 1,178 tonnes in February, from 843 tonnes in the same month last year, the Board said.
The country’s total FCV tobacco export increased by 11 per cent to 1.13 lakh tonnes during the first 10 months of the current financial year, compared to 1.02 lakh tonnes in the previous year.
India produces about 700 million kg of tobacco annually, out of which 30 per cent is FCV tobacco. On an average, 50 per cent FCV tobacco is used by the domestic cigarettes industry, while the rest is exported.

LONDON: The warning ‘Smokers Die Younger’ doesn’t seem to ring a bell with superstar Daniel Radcliffe who has been nicknamed ‘Harry Puffer’ by his co-stars for puffing about 20 cigarettes a day.
The young wizard rushes to light a stick whenever the director yells "Cut" and has now been advised by one and all on the set of the new Hogwarts movie to kick the butt.
The teenage star finishes around a pack per day and has pals, including fellow Potter star Rupert Grint, pretty worried.
"Daniel has recently been smoking up to 20 cigarettes a day. Every time they call ‘Cut’, he lights up. It’s disgusting. Friends and co-stars including Rupert Grint have been warning him about the dangers of smoking. But he doesn’t take any notice," The Sun quoted a source, as saying.
Also worried are the producers of the final flick in the series, who believe that his puffing habits may destroy his schoolboy image. They have now warned him not to be seen smoking in public.
"He’s been having late nights out with stars like Kevin Spacey and Stephen Fry and seems to have picked up bad habits from the luvvie set," revealed the source.
In fact, Radcliffe was so nervous doing a stunt himself and turned to his cigarettes while his double was absent.
"He was sparking up constantly," said the source.

MADISON, Wis. - Wisconsin businesses would have to sell fire-safe cigarettes that automatically extinguish when they’re not being smoked under a bill that has passed the state Senate.
The measure now heads to Gov. Jim Doyle for his consideration. The Assembly has also passed it.
Wisconsin would join 22 other states in allowing only fire-safe cigarettes to be sold. Firefighters and emergency responders support the measure.
Tobacco companies have not fought it. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company plans to voluntarily switch all its cigarettes to the fire-safe kind by the end of next year.

KOLKATA: Finance minister P Chidambaram did not spare cigarette manufacturers for the fourth consecutive year. He increased the total excise duty on non-filter cigarettes to bring them on par with filter cigarettes in Union Budget 2008-09. The move is estimated to put an additional burden on the industry, which will get passed on to the consumers.

Airing its disappointment on the excise increase on non-filter cigarettes, which account for nearly 30% of the total industry volume, the Tobacco Institute of India said in a statement: “Duty on micro plains (cigarettes of length upto 60 mm) has gone up by almost five times — from Rs 173.04 per 1,000 to Rs 843.57) and on plains (cigarettes of length between 60-70 mm) by about 2½ times — from Rs 562.38 to Rs 1,362.69.”

“Put together, the plains segment constituting over a quarter of the industry volume, will get wiped out. Cigarette consumers will now be compelled to shift to cheaper forms of tobacco consumption which are even more toxic. This kind of unprecedented treatment of the Indian cigarette industry is senseless and retrograde,” the institute stated in the media release.

Industry sources, too, are a disgruntled lot primarily because cigarettes account for only 15% of overall tobacco consumption and generates as much as 85% of the total revenue from tobacco. Revenue mopups from the cigarette industry have increased by more than eight times to an estimated Rs 8,350 crore in 2007-08 from Rs 988 crore in 1984-85 (when the tax was ad valorem) despite an 11% growth in volumes over the last 23 years.

Corroborating, ITC’s corporate communication VP Nazeeb Arif said: “The cigarette industry has been hit once again following the increase in excise duty on plains. The move is expected to drive users to revenue inefficient forms of tobacco products.”

Sources said the finance minister had, in his speech, stated that he is raising the tax on non-filters as these are more toxic than filter cigarettes. He must also know that beedis, which have a higher tar content than cigarettes, are also non-filter,” the institute said.

Incidentally, non-filters are by and large consumed by relatively weaker economic sections of the society and offers the beedi smoker a chance to upgrade to a better quality product.

Companies like ITC Ltd, Godfrey Phillips and VST Industries have reasons to cheer as the finance minister has doubled the basic customs duty on cigars, cheroots and cigarillos to 60% with immediate effect.

It’s not a new idea - twenty-two other states are already doing it. Requiring only "fire safe" cigarettes to be sold in stores. Hawaii could be next.

"We’re looking at ways to improve Hawaii’s ability to protect against brushfires and fires in general," says Rep. Ryan Yamane, (D) Mililani, Waipahu, Waipio.

Lawmakers are pushing forward with a bill to ensure "fire safe" cigarettes are the only kind of cigarettes sold in Hawaii. Made with a special paper that’s supposed to go out if it’s not puffed on every few minutes.

Watch the difference when we compare a regular cigarette on the left with a "fire safe" cigarette on the right. Within minutes the "fire safe" cigarette goes out and the regular one keeps on burning.

"It will actually prevent people from those who fall asleep at home with the cigarette burning in an ashtray, when it reaches that band the cigarette is supposed to go out," says Yamane.

A difference that could have saved the life of a Makiki woman who died when her apartment caught fire in ‘99. A blaze that started from a lit cigarette.

The same start to last years 600-acre brushfire on Maui.

"Tthese fire safe cigarettes will prevent fires," says Rep. Cindy Evans, (D) North Kona, South Kohala. "The fire chief’s totally believe it will save lives, it will prevent fires so I think we should support this."

So far the bill has faced little opposition - even from cigarette manufacturers themselves.

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company has said they already plan to convert all of their brands to "fire safe" cigarettes by the end of next year.

Hawaii is among fifteen other states considering this type of legisaltion. The bill now goes before the full House for their vote.

British American Tobacco has won the auction for Turkey’s state-owned tobacco group Tekel, with a bid of $1.72bn (£894m), in the company’s first major takeover in five years.

The acquisition by the world’s second biggest tobacco group comes just weeks after Turkey’s parliament passed a law banning smoking in public places and raised the country’s consumption tax on tobacco.

Richard Hodgson, in charge of investment at BAT, said the ban would hit consumption but he expected the decline to be less than 10pc. Turkey is the world’s eighth biggest tobacco market with consumption of 115bn cigarettes a year in a country with a population of 71m people. The acquisition will give BAT a 36pc share of the market, behind market leader Altria which has 41pc.

BAT fought off bids from Citigroup’s international venture capital arm and private equity group Cinven. The acquisition has been opposed in Turkey where factory workers staged a sit-in in protest against the sale, the first sell-off in a state privatisation programme.

BAT, which makes Dunhill, Kent, Pall Mall and Lucky Strike cigarettes, said the deal would be earnings enhancing from 2009. BAT shares rose 16p to £18.74.

1492- Columbus Discovers Tobacco. In his journal, Columbus mentions tobacco for the first time. Rodrigo de Jerez and Luis de Torres first observe the native smoking ritual and try it themselves. Jerez becomes the first smoker of western decent.
1556-Tobacco use spreads to the old world through Spain and Portugal. The plant that grew from these seeds is christened Nicotina tabacura by Linnaeus, thereby immortalizing Jean Nicot’s name. Later the addictive alkaloid is called nicotine.
1548 - The Portuguese begin to grow tobacco for export in Brazil.
1770 - The first tobacco shop is established in Lancaster.
1826 - England is importing only 26 lbs of cigars per year. By 1830, England is importing 250,000 lbs per year. 1847 - Philip Morris is open for business in England. They sell hand rolled Turkish cigarettes.
1854 - Philip Morris begins making its own cigarettes in London, on Bond Street
1881 - James E. Bonsack invents the automated cigarette-making machine. It can produce 200 cigarettes per minute, a production rate which would have previously taken 50 workers, thereby markedly reducing the cost of production. Within one year the largest cigarette manufacturer sells more than a billion cigarettes annually.
1832 - The cigarette is invented by an Egyptian artilleryman during the siege of Acre. The Egyptian’s cannon crew had improved their rate of fire by rolling the gunpowder in paper tubes. For this, he and his crew were rewarded with a pound of tobacco. Their only pipe was broken, so they took to rolling the pipe tobacco in the paper tubes.
1864 - First American cigarette factory opens and produces almost 20 million cigarettes annually.
1875 - Allen & Ginter cigarette brands, Richmond Straight Cut No. 1 and Pet, begin using picture cards to stiffen the pack and protect the cigarettes. The cards, with photos of actresses, baseball players, Indian Chiefs, and boxers are enormously successful and represent the first modern promotion scheme for a manufactured product.
1901 - 3.5 billion cigarettes and 6 billion cigars are sold. Four in five American men smoke at least one cigar a day.
1902 - Tiny Philip Morris sets up a corporation in New York to sell its British brands, including Philip Morris, Blues, Cambridge, Derby, and a cigarette named after Marlborough Street, where its London factory is located. Marlboro is one of the earliest woman’s cigarettes, featuring a red tip to hide lipstick marks. It does not catch on with the public.
1910 - Most popular brands: Pall Mall, Sweet Caporals, Piedmont, Helmar and Fatima.
1913 - RJ Reynolds introduces Camel, considered by historians as the first ‘modern’ cigarette.
1917 - During World War I cigarettes become the smoke of choice as pipes and cigars prove unmanageable at the front. Between 1910 and 1919 cigarette production increases by 633% from under 10 billion/year to nearly 70 billion/year and cigarette smoking begins to become fixed among American men. The American Red Cross and the Young Men’s Christian Association, previously opposed to the propagation of cigarettes, actively supply them to the troops overseas.
1921 - RJ Reynolds spends $8 million in advertising, mostly on Camel. Inaugurates the highly successful "I’d Walk a Mile for a Camel" slogan.
1924 - Philip Morris re-introduces Marlboro with the slogan "Mild as May," targeting "decent, respectable" women. "Has smoking any more to do with a woman’s morals than has the color of her hair?" the advertisement reads. "Marlboros now ride in so many limousines, attend so many bridge parties, and repose in so many handbags."
1927 - A sensation is created when George Washington Hill blatantly aims Lucky Strike advertising campaign at women, urging them to "reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet." Smoking initiation rates among adolescent females triple between 1925-1935, and Lucky Strike captures 38% of the American market.
1936 - Brown and Williamson introduce Viceroy, the first national brand to feature a filter of cellulose acetate. Advertising increases the use of physicians to counter the claims that cigarettes are a major health problem.
1940 - Adult Americans smoke 2,558 cigarettes per capita a year, nearly twice the consumption of 1930
1945 - Smoking is now socially acceptable for women. Another generation of Americans is now habituated to tobacco as a result of free cigarettes distributed by the Red Cross and other organizations to our fighting men and women.
1952 - Kent introduces the ‘Micronite’ filter, which Lorillard claims "offers the greatest health protection in cigarette history." It turns out to be made of asbestos. Kent discontinues use of the Micronite filter four years later.
1954 - RJ Reynolds:- introduces:- Winston:- filter cigarettes, but promotes the taste benefit, not health. Winston dominates the US market for the next 15 years.
1954 - Marlboro advertising taken over by the Chicago ad agency Leo Burnett. "Delivers the Goods on Flavor" ran the new slogan in newspaper ads. Design of the campaign, which features ‘Marlboro Men,’ is credited to John Landry of Philip Morris. Prior to initiating this campaign, Marlboro had <1% of the US market.
1963 – Marlboro dispenses with tattooed sailors and athletes as the Marlboro Man and settles on the exclusive use of cowboys. For several years, Philip Morris research had shown that sales increased whenever they cowboys appeared in their campaigns.
1964 - Marlboro Country ad campaign is launched. "Come to where the flavor is. Come to Marlboro Country." Marlboro sales begin growing at 10% a year.
1968 - Philip Morris introduces Virginia Slims with the slogan, "You’ve come a long way, baby." Five yeas later, Billy Jean King, wearing Virginia Slims colors, defeats Bobby Riggs in the televised ‘Battle of the Sexes.’ Virginia Slims continues to promote tennis matches to this day.
1972 - Marlboro becomes the best-selling cigarette in the world. It remains so today by a wide margin. 1999 - About 10 million Americans smoke cigars.
2002 - CDC estimates smoking health and productivity costs reach $150 billion a year, according to a new study published in this week’s WMMR. CDC estimated the total cost of smoking at $3,391 a year for every smoker, and even itemized the per-pack health/productivity costs at $7.18/pack. Further, it estimated the smoking-related medical costs at $3.45 per pack, and job productivity lost because of premature death from smoking at $3.73 per pack.
Current campaign Fire-safe cigarette legislation has been passed or introduced in many states. To maintain regulatory uniformity, all states and countries are using the “model” FSC regulatory bill based on the New York FSC law. With identical fire safety regulations for cigarettes in all states and countries, cigarette manufacturers can voluntarily produce FSC worldwide. Until then, legislative campaigns mandating FSC will continue.

Cigarette butts, plastic and glass bottles, bottle tops and cans were the most commonly found pieces of rubbish in last year’s Clean Up Australia Day.

And six of the top 10 items found were recyclable, Clean Up Australia chairman Ian Kiernan said.

Releasing the annual Rubbish Report, Mr Kiernan said more than 8000 tonnes of rubbish was collected in last year’s clean-up.

Cigarette butts remained the most commonly found rubbish item for the 12th year in a row, accounting for 12.2 per cent of all items found.

For the 13th consecutive year, recyclable plastics made up the majority of rubbish collected.

"Thousands of tonnes of recyclable rubbish are dumped in the environment each year," Mr Kiernan said.

"As a general rule, Australians are pretty good recyclers but these statistics prove there’s still a long way to go."

Mr Kiernan and federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett will launch this year’s Clean Up day with a new advertising campaign on climate change. The advertisement highlights how much of Australia’s unique natural environment could be lost without greater action to limit the impacts of climate change.

This year’s Clean Up Australia Day will be on Sunday, March 2.

Tobacco and cigarettes has a long history dating. The tobacco plant is believed to be widely spread in America since the 1st Century.

The written history of cigarettes dates back to the early 16th century when Spaniards conquerors witnessed the Aztec Indians smoking an ancient cigarette, it was a cane or reed tube stuffed with tobacco.

It was the Spaniards who introduced the cigar in the old world. Early in the 16th century, beggars of Seville picked up discarded cigar butts, shredded the contexts rolled them back in paper and termed those as cigarillos. Cigarettes spread through Europe in the wake of the Napoleonic wars and became common towards the middle of the century.

A cigarette factory was established in 1853 but it was after the Crimean war where British got the first taste of cigarettes, which was the outset of cigarette’s immense upcoming popularity. The French were the people who gave cigarettes their present name, which meant ‘little cigar’.

In 1882, the cigarette was a specialty item made by hand, sold for a penny apiece, and very much the stepchild of other tobacco products. However, that was about to change.

An automated cigarette rolling machine, developed by 18-year-old James Bonsack, was put into use in 1883 and revolutionized cigarette production. The retail price was cut in half, and volume, which in premachine days had never exceeded 500 million, leaped to 10 billion by 1910. American Tobacco was able to take advantage of this new technology and, like Standard Oil, was such a success that it, too, and was broken up by the feds in 1911.

In the 1840s the cigarette industry was born, although cigarettes were still rolled by hand, mainly by women. In 1881 the cigarette-rolling machine was invented, increasing production exponentially. Offering a cigarette and a light became a ritual of sociability. The two World Wars helped spread the habit widely.

During the 1920s women took up smoking as a sign of modernity. The development of mass media and advertising in the late 19th and 20th Century played a decisive role in securing the popularity of cigarettes . Today 93 percent of the world’s tobacco is consumed as cigarettes .

There are several great benefits to deciding to buy your tobacco product online. You can not only save yourself time you can also end up saving a ton of money.