From Reuters, via the Standard:
China will not allow new cigarette factories, including joint ventures with foreign partners, as part of efforts to reduce smoking in a country that puffs its way through almost two trillion cigarettes a year.
Beijing would also impose strict controls on existing tobacco production, including taxes on tobacco leaf and industry reorganization, Xinhua News Agency quoted Sha Zukang, the ambassador to United Nations agencies in Geneva, as telling a conference.
China is the world’s largest cigarette producer and Chinese are the world’s most enthusiastic smokers, with a growing market of about 320 million making it a magnet for multinationals and focus of international health concern.
