Monthly Archives: May 2011

Editor’s Note:  The following article from a Liverpool (UK) newspaper highlights the extreme health hazards from counterfeit cigarettes due to their being contaminated by everything from rat droppings to insecticide.  The article’s note that  “almost a quarter of regular smokers admitted buying dodgy packs of cigarettes” makes clear that counterfeit cigarettes are a major public health hazard.

ECHO Investigation: Liverpool’s multi-million pound trade in illegal cigarettes from China

by Ben Rossington, Liverpool Echo

Editor’s Note: The following is from CRE Brazil.

On Thursday, the 26th, the local government of the city of Campo Grande in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul approved a law that punishes businesses selling illegal cigarettes or cigarettes with substitute ingredients or ingredients in addition to tobacco. Since it is on the border with Paraguay, where most of the contraband cigarettes are traded in Brazil, Mato Grosso do Sul is one of the states where some of the largest numbers of seizures of illegal products occurs.

Editor’s Note: The following is from CRE Brazil.

The Federal Revenue Office established a series of norms to avoid cigarettes exported by Brazilian industries returning to the Country as contraband. Now, products destined to be sent abroad will have a special bar code on their packages which will store all the producer’s data. Companies that make the appropriate changes will be exempt from export taxes which are equivalent to 150% of the market value.

Packages of cigarettes sold in Brazil will have to include the following inscription: “For export only – The selling of this product in Brazil is prohibited.” If an inspection catches these products circulating in the national market, they will be considered illegal merchandise resulting in serious fines.

The thirtieth anniversary of OMB’s regulatory review office, OIRA-the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, was celebrated on Friday, May 20th.  The event was sponsored by Susan Dudley, a former OIRA Administrator, who presently heads the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center.

Virtually all former Administrators and Deputy Administrators made presentations, including Jim Tozzi, the first Deputy Administrator of OIRA.

The Bureau of National Affairs Reports:

“Jim Tozzi, the first deputy administrator of OIRA, said the institution gives a protective shield against the wholesale dismantling of regulatory agencies, which play an integral role in society.

Editor’s Note:  As recounted in the following article, the Australian customs authorities seem to be completely unaware of the extensive links between organized crime and counterfeit cigarette smuggling.  If they perused even these few sample links here, here, here, and here, they would gain a better sense of global criminal threat from counterfeit cigarettes.

From: The Age (Australia)

Big tobacco lobby ‘scaremongering’