Balearic smokers kicking the habit

Joan Collins
THE sale of cigarettes reached 7.4 million packs in the Balearics in January, the first month of the national Antitobacco Law. This is a drop of 25 percent in relation to January 2005 and a much greater drop than the national average which was 4.2 percent according to the Tobacco Market Commission. With regard to the value of sales, sales of cigarettes dropped by 32.9 percent in the Balearics in January, to little more than 16 million euros which is also a much greater drop than the national average (-12 percent). These figures are in accordance with the expectations of the directors of the national Ministry of Health and Consumer Affairs, who even before the approval of the Antitobacco Law predicted a drop in tobacco consumption in 2006 coinciding with the arrival of the Law and the Government's financial measures to continue the fight against smoking. The big drop in the case of the Balearics is also attributable to the Balearic Law of Drug Dependency and Other Addictions, which came into force last July and also caused a drop in the sales of cigarettes, which fell by two percent last year in relation to 2004. In January 2006, there has been a drop in sales in all forms of tobacco in the islands. Altogether, sales of packs of cigarettes, cigars, rolling tobacco and pipe tobacco fell by 34.6 percent in the Balearics. The most noticeable reduction has been in the sales of rolling tobacco with a drop of 62 percent while the sales of cigars dropped by 31.6 percent and pipe tobacco by 27.7 percent. The national drop in sales of cigarettes in January confirms the change in habits which started with the drop of 0.6 percent registered in 2005 when it fell for the first time in five years. Until then, there had been annual rises in the sales of cigarettes (1.9 percent in 2000, 2.7 percent in 2001, 0.8 percent in 2002, 1.9 percent in 2003 and 1 percent in 2004). According to the figures from the Commission, Altadis has the lion's share of the market as far as cigarettes are concerned, with its brand “Ducados Rubio” which in January sold 16.382 percent of the total packs sold and had a significant rise in its level of sales, 16.374 percentage points. The “Marlboro” brand from Philip Morris was in second place with 16.344 percent after losing two percentage points of the market.