China's Tobacco Industry Meets on Technology for Making Reduced-Harm Cigarettes

Source from:  Yangtze River Daily newspaper 10/18/2007

The tobacco industry of China held its 2007 high-level forum on independent technological innovation in Wuhan City of central China's Hubei Province on October 12, with the focus on the innovation and development of technologies for lowering the content of tar in cigarette smoke and producing reduced-harm cigarettes. Sources with the tobacco industry say that as all big tobacco manufacturers in China are vying with one another in developing new products, the development and production of low-tar-level cigarettes will become a major trend of business development for the tobacco industry. In an address to the meeting, Deputy Director-General Zhang Baozhen of the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration (STMA) said that as a result of efforts of the tobacco industry to strengthen the research and development of technologies for producing cigarettes with a lower content of tar and other harmful substances, the average tar level in cigarettes manufactured in China steadily declined to a low of 13.2mg/per cigarette in 2006, from 25mg/per cigarette in the 1980s, and that the tobacco industry has succeeded in developing a series of low-tar-level cigarettes highly competitive at the marketplace. Also speaking at the meeting, a top leader of Wuhan Tobacco Group said that the average tar level in the new cigarette products developed by Wuhan Tobacco Group is only 8mg/per cigarette, and that the average tar level some new products can be as low as 3mg/per cigarette. In a related development, Wuhan Tobacco Group - a large Chinese tobacco manufacturer designated by the STMA - generated over 10 billion yuan (1.31 billion U.S. dollars) in taxes and profits in the first nine months of 2007, a sharp increase of 42 percent year-on-year. In particular, the sales volume of the famous Yellow Crane Tower cigarette brand rose by 65 percent year-on-year and the Red Golden Dragon 33 percent year-on-year. Sources with Wuhan Tobacco Group said that the group has managed to improve the production process of competitive brands some 100 times and improve the blending formulas of products some 1,000 times. So far in 2007, Wuhan Tobacco Group has filed applications for 64 patents, in addition to the 139 applications for patents filed over past years. Besides, Wuhan Tobacco Group has established long-term relations of cooperation with more than 20 research institutes and universities in China, achieving technological progress in an all-round way. Delegates attending the meeting agreed that Wuhan Tobacco Group has taken the lead in technological innovation in the tobacco industry of China. Enditem