Cigarette Retailers in Beijing Required to Indicate Tar Level

03/31/2005

Cigarette retailers in the Chinese capital city of Beijing are required by a new government notice to indicate the tar level of cigarettes they sell besides the marked price on the price tag as of April 1. According to a notice issued by Beijing City Development and Restructuring Commission on March 23, all cigarette retailers in Beijing City must use a uniform price tag to indicate the brand name, place of origin, specification, pricing unit, tar level, marked retail price, etc of the cigarettes they sell. According to the notice, the unit pricing of cigarettes will indicated by the carton while the unit price of cigars will be marked by the rod. The unit price of single packets will be by the marked price. The uniform price tags to be used will be designed by Beijing City Tobacco Monopoly Administration and will be exclusively printed under supervision of Beijing City Development and Restructuring Commission, according to the notice. It says that no institution or individual may print or distribute the uniform price tag without authorization. In the notice, Beijing City Development and Restructuring Commission explains that brand name refers to the name of the cigarette brand and that specification covers the packaging (soft or hard), color, length, etc of the cigarettes on sale. All the price tags must be checked and signed by designated persons, according to the notice. It says that the uniform price tags will be exclusively distributed by district- or county-level tobacco monopoly administrative authorities to cigarette retailers under their management. The pricing of cigarettes on the uniform price tag should be done on the basis of suggested prices set by Beijing City Tobacco Monopoly Administration, and the prices should be legibly recognizable and indicate the true value of the product, according to sources with the administration. Whenever there is a price change, the uniform price tag must be renewed in a timely manner, the notice says. It notes that the uniform price tag should be placed at the left-hand side beneath the carton or right beneath the packet. For retailers also selling cigarettes to foreigners, they are required by the notice to indicate marked prices in both the Chinese and English languages. But any sales shall be computable by the Chinese yuan. The notice urges the tobacco monopoly administrative authorities at all levels in Beijing City to actively cooperate with the pricing control administrative authorities in strengthening management and supervision over the pricing of cigarettes on sale in the city. A number of other Chinese regions, including Dalian City in northeast China and Fujian Province in southeast China, have already applied the system of requiring local cigarette retailers to indicate marked prices of tobacco products they sell. Since the entry into effect of this system in these regions, the order of tobacco trade on local markets has obviously turned for the better, with consumers becoming increasingly confident in cigarette sales. Enditem