Recently, New Zealand passed a law permanently banning the sale of cigarettes to anyone born in or after 2009, and gradually increasing the legal smoking age each year. By 2023, individuals must be at least 15 years old to purchase cigarettes. By 2024, they must be at least 16 years old, and so on, until the lowest legal age is 42 years old by 2050.
New Zealand will also reduce the number of stores allowed to sell cigarettes to 5 million nationwide.
This is the second-strongest anti-smoking law in the world, second only to Bhutan, which completely banned tobacco in 2010.
This indicates a strong commitment to curb smoking in a country that already has the lowest smoking rate in the world, with only 8% of New Zealanders smoking. However, smoking is highly concentrated among Maori people (22.3% of adults smoke) and Pacific Islanders (17% of adults smoke).
However, this approach focuses on creating a so-called smoke-free generation, but overlooks an important perspective: smoking is already a gradually declining choice for tobacco consumption. Instead, smokeless products such as e-cigarettes, vaping, and heated tobacco will create the next generation of nicotine addicts.
There are approximately one billion smokers in the world. However, despite some markets still growing, especially in Africa where the number of smokers is increasing, including among young users, in many countries, a combination of taxation, public health warnings, education, and restrictions on public smoking has greatly reduced the number of smokers.
New Zealand is one of the countries where the proportion of smokers has declined by more than half over the past decade - from 16.4% in 2012 to 8% in 2022.
However, this does not actually mean a decrease in tobacco consumption in New Zealand. The share of tobacco consumption lost due to extensive cigarette regulations has essentially been replaced by smokeless products. Although these products do not always use tobacco directly, they provide nicotine derived from plants and are therefore considered a new generation of tobacco products.
Nicotine consumption methods such as electronic cigarettes or heating are rapidly becoming more popular. For example, in the United States, a study published in the 2020 issue of the American Medical Association found that up to 20% of 12th grade students (approximately 17 and 18 years old) use electronic cigarettes daily, while only 12% smoke traditional cigarettes.
New Zealand is also following a similar trend. In 2021, a survey published in the New Zealand Public Health Journal found that e-cigarettes are more attractive to young people than smoking. These are not former smokers: 80% of adolescents have tried e-cigarettes at some point, and 50% of regular e-cigarette users have never smoked before starting vaping, which undermines claims that transitioning from cigarettes to smoke-free products reduces harm.
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