The National Tobacco Work Conference in 2025 pointed out the need to closely monitor changes in the situation, further strengthen the supervision of tobacco monopoly, crack down severely on all types of illegal activities related to tobacco, carry out extraordinary measures to combat counterfeit and smuggling of cigarettes, enhance the effectiveness of regulating e-cigarettes and other new tobacco-related products, strictly strengthen internal management of tobacco monopoly and enforce laws, effectively clean up the tobacco market environment, and safeguard national and consumer interests.
Guangdong, as a gathering place for e-cigarette related manufacturing companies in China, has a concentrated industrial layout, a large number of enterprises, and significant local regulatory responsibilities. In recent years, the Guangdong Tobacco Monopoly Bureau has focused on market purification, strengthened supervision in accordance with the law, and continuously consolidated the achievements of legal and standardized governance of the e-cigarette industry. This has provided a "Guangdong experience" for improving the effectiveness of e-cigarette regulation across the entire chain through measures such as lawfully conducting licensing and access, strictly regulating production and business activities, increasing market supervision, cracking down on illegal and irregular behaviours, and promoting legal education to create a favorable legal environment.
How are e-cigarette manufacturers regulated?
Shortly after New Year's Day, the sun shone on the factory area of a certain e-cigarette production company in Huizhou City. In accordance with the requirements of "double random, and one public" supervision work, enforcement officers from the Huizhou Tobacco Monopoly Bureau arrived early to begin their inspection work for the day.
Law enforcement officers entered the production workshop, carefully inspected production records, raw material procurement ledgers, and product quality testing reports, among other things, to check whether the company has strictly implemented the relevant laws, regulations, and policy requirements for e-cigarette regulation.
Law enforcement officers are already very familiar with this inspection process.
Following the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration's directive for a special inspection on regulating the e-cigarette market order in 2024, various relevant departments of the Guangdong Provincial Bureau and city-level bureaus have actively taken on responsibilities and fulfilled their duties in accordance with their assigned tasks. From March to July last year, a special inspection on regulating the e-cigarette market order was conducted across the province, resulting in significant achievements.
During the special inspection period, a total of 14,461 inspectors were deployed across the province, carrying out 292 joint law enforcement operations and overseeing compliance with laws and regulations 1,585 times. According to officials from the relevant department of the Guangdong Provincial Bureau, eight municipal bureaus including Zhuhai, Foshan, and Zhongshan strictly carried out their duties, conducting inspections on e-cigarette related production enterprises in the province (excluding Shenzhen) based on 9 projects and 16 key points. Any non-compliant companies were handled according to the law and regulations, and were supervised to complete the necessary corrections.
Implementing dynamic management of licenses for e-cigarette related production enterprises is a key measure to strengthen industry supervision and maintain market order. The Guangdong Provincial Bureau has effectively strengthened the pre-approval review of administrative licenses for production enterprises and steadily promoted the improvement of license records. At the same time, they closely monitor the business dynamics of enterprises and, for production enterprises that have not engaged in production and operation activities for more than 6 consecutive months, implement monthly regulatory warnings to urge the relevant enterprises to timely comply with license management procedures.
In the process of promoting standardized operation of e-cigarette related production enterprises, it is crucial to comprehensively cement the responsibility of local supervision of production enterprises. The Guangdong Provincial Bureau has taken an active role, guiding the Guangzhou Municipal Bureau to pilot and explore, formulate supervision guidelines, clearly define the key content, key links, and operation processes of supervision, laying a solid foundation for the effective advancement of supervision work. They carefully and rigorously conduct preliminary and final reviews of various statistical data submitted by production enterprises each month, deeply integrating compliance and early warning work into the entire supervision process, and helping enterprises enhance their risk prevention and control capabilities.
How to solve the difficulties in market supervision
On January 8th, in order to further strengthen cross-regional regulatory coordination and protect the physical and mental health of minors, the Guangdong provincial bureau established an e-cigarette regulatory cooperation mechanism with the Shenzhen Tobacco Monopoly Bureau.
This is a vivid practice of Guangdong Provincial Bureau establishing a cross-departmental, cross-regional joint supervision mechanism. They have incorporated e-cigarette market supervision into the framework of "specialized supervision", actively establishing collaborative mechanisms with relevant units, implementing national policies related to restricted industries, and coordinating government departments in a unified and coordinated manner.
The e-cigarette case has no precedent to follow. The Guangdong Provincial Bureau did not hesitate, standing firm in their law enforcement and prosecution duties. They closely cooperated with public security and other departments to enhance monitoring of online and offline sales channels. In 2024, they successfully handled 525 e-cigarette cases, seized a large amount of illegal e-cigarette products, with a total amount involved reaching 5.36 billion yuan. They arrested 603 criminal suspects and forged a team of e-cigarette regulators who are skilled, competent, and tough in their work. Their accomplishments are replicable and promotable.
Police in Guangzhou have cracked a fake e-cigarette production and sales case related to the "5·10" incident, with a total value of approximately 6.1368 million yuan; in Dongguan, they also solved a similar case linked to the "5·17" incident, with a total value of around 83.9139 million yuan... Faced with a complex market situation, the Guangdong Provincial Public Security Bureau has continued to intensify efforts to crack down on illegal activities related to e-cigarettes, with significant results achieved.
The Guangdong Provincial Bureau actively innovates its regulatory model, with the Dongguan Municipal Bureau serving as the "vanguard". The Dongguan Municipal Bureau actively participates in the digital transformation trend of e-cigarette regulation, working together with relevant departments of the Guangdong Provincial Bureau to promote a study project on the comprehensive regulation of e-cigarette production enterprises. They strengthen cooperation with tax authorities, customs, market supervision, and other departments, integrating data from multiple sources to achieve collaborative governance. This includes constructing a big data risk assessment model, creating a regulatory profile of companies, and enhancing regulatory precision.
How to create a healthy market ecosystem
On December 3rd of last year, a "Legal Education in Schools" event with the theme of "Youthful Vigor, Rule of Law Protection" was held at the Baiyun Campus of Guangdong Experimental High School. The Guangdong Provincial Bureau systematically explained relevant laws and regulations to students through case studies and vivid examples, providing them with a comprehensive understanding of the rule of law.
The Guangdong Tobacco Commercial System's various levels of regulatory departments are focusing on strengthening the promotion of legal knowledge and creating a healthy market environment. According to the characteristics of the subject, they are using diverse channels and methods to collaborate with multiple departments to conduct public legal education activities in schools. These activities include lectures, case studies, and Q&A sessions to protect minors from the harm of e-cigarettes.
During the interview, a remark from a relevant official at the Dongguan City Bureau struck a chord with the reporters: "We must make concerted efforts to ensure that private e-cigarette production enterprises and operators voluntarily embrace regulation.
The Guangdong provincial bureau, in conjunction with routine inspections and legal education work, actively carries out legal education activities in collaboration with departments such as market regulation and postal management. In the process of advancing regulation lectures, policy interpretation, and business guidance, a variety of targeted training activities have been conducted to effectively enhance the compliance awareness of production enterprises and retail entities, prompting them to deeply understand that "they are also under legal protection while undergoing supervision.
It is reported that the "Yue Smoke Pop Law" legal culture construction project launched by the Guangdong Provincial Bureau has won the Guangdong Provincial National Organs' "Who Enforces the Law, Who Popularizes the Law" Excellent Popularization of Law Work Project for three consecutive years. Various city-level bureaus have also been recognized as excellent popularization of law units in their respective areas. Among them, the Dongguan Municipal Bureau has innovatively launched the first tobacco monopoly enforcement live broadcast program in the province - Sunshine "Enforcement" Broadcasting, which has been reported on platforms such as Study Xi, effectively promoting the formation of a good atmosphere of respecting the law, learning the law, abiding by the law, and using the law.
With strong regulation and warm service, the Dongguan Municipal Bureau, in collaboration with relevant government departments, organized specialized training sessions on intellectual property protection to help manufacturing enterprises enhance their risk prevention and control awareness and response capabilities, thereby assisting in the smooth and healthy development of businesses.
After three years of practice, the e-cigarette market in Guangdong has undergone a fundamental transformation from a lack of regulation to rule of law, from disorder to regulation, and from uncontrolled growth to strict management. The governance of the e-cigarette industry has comprehensively entered the track of legalization and standardization, gradually shifting from "being managed" to "being well managed.
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