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The Department of Health has tabled the new tobacco Bill in Parliament which introduces such onerous restrictions, that it will force many small and micro businesses to close their doors, placing them and their employees at risk.
This is according to Diane Bravo, owner of specialist tobacco retailer, Casa Tabacs. Bravo also owned Sturks, the oldest tobacco store in South Africa, established in 1793, which she had to shut down as a result of Government’s Covid-related tobacco ban.
The new tobacco Bill will ban the display of all tobacco products, including harm reduction products such as e-cigarettes, vapes and heat-not-burn products, at retail level, even in specialist tobacco stores.
Bravo says: “While the Bill contains many absurd restrictions, the ban on displaying a legal tobacco product in a specialist tobacco store is tantamount to a complete ban on the sale of those products. As a specialist tobacco retailer, I can’t imagine what my store will look like if I can’t display any of the products that I sell. At the very least, Government should exempt specialist tobacconists, who don’t sell products to anyone younger than 18. Those that enter our stores, only do so to buy tobacco products.”
According to the new Bill, the penalties for displaying a single tobacco product, even if it’s left on the counter inadvertently, will be a fine and, or 10 years in prison.
Bravo believes that the new Bill will also hand the remaining legal tobacco sector over to organised criminals. “The tobacco ban during the pandemic should have been a lesson in how not to legislate, and to properly consider the unintended consequences of new laws. During the ban, the legal sector’s market share plummeted as they were unable to sell any products. The result was that the illicit tobacco market, which continued to sell illegal and counterfeit cigarettes and tobacco products, entrenched their dominance in the SA market.”
According to Professor van Walbeek from UCT’s Research Unit on the Economics of Excisable Products (Reep), the effects of the tobacco ban, which was lifted in August 2020, have been irreversible and have entrenched the illicit trade, which is now sitting at 54%.
Bravo says: “This is a direct result of the tobacco ban. Government will never be able to undo the damage of their bad legislative decisions, and the new Bill is simply a ban by other name, which is going further entrench criminality and the prevalence and availability of cheap, illegal products which don’t contribute a single cent to the fiscus, and undermine Government’s health objectives.”
The Bill will also introduce plain packaging, which means that all packs of cigarettes, and other tobacco products, will look the same, with the same colour, font and health warnings and pictures. Bravo believes that since this removes any brand differentiation, and makes it extremely easy to copy, it is going to exacerbate South Africa’s growing counterfeit product problem, thereby further entrenching criminality, and depriving the fiscus of much-needed taxes.
Bravo says: “There is no evidence or any real research that bans and prohibitions work. In fact, we have seen in South Africa that they don’t. Education, enforcement and awareness of tobacco-related health issues, and the benefits of switching to non-combustible tobacco products such as heat-not-burn, e-cigarettes and vapes seems to me to be the sensible way to drive behavioural change. It’s frustrating that our Government learned nothing from the Covid-19 pandemic. But we as citizens and small business owners certainly did. We learned that unless we speak up against ridiculous laws, Government will simply proceed with no regard for the real impact of its actions. So as Government prepares to railroad this Bill into law, I implore each and every citizen and small business owner to speak up against this draconian piece of legislation.
“My message to Government is: We can barely keep the lights on due to load-shedding, and now you want to completely switch them off with a display ban. How much more do small businesses need to endure to survive? It’s enough.”
This post and content is written by Diane Bravo. This post was sponsored and supplied by PMI.
