Let’s Do This … Smokefree 2025

Press Release: NZ Smokeless Tobacco Co

LET’S DO THIS… SMOKEFREE 2025

Smokefree 2025 is only seven years away, and New Zealand is running out of time.

Action for Smokefree 2025 says that the goal is to get smoking rates below 5% by 2025, however at the current rate of decline it will take until 2040.

In August, then-Associate Health Minister Nicky Wagner announced plans to establish a pre-market approval system for smokeless tobacco and nicotine-delivery products, other than e-cigarettes. An amendment to the Smokefree Environments Act was planned to be introduced into Parliament early this year.

So far, the new Labour-led Government has not mentioned anything on this matter.

“This is a massive concern, as we are still losing around 5000 Kiwis a year to smoking,” director of NZ Smokeless Tobacco Co, Miles Illemann says.

Since the birth of the 2025 smokefree goal set out in 2011, there has been no word on a Government plan in order to achieve this goal.

“With the current statistics relating to smoking prevalence in New Zealand, we are at a shocking 15% of the total population smoking every day.”

NZ Smokeless Tobacco Co believes it's time the Ministry of Health addressed this issue in Parliament and starts looking into the “Swedish experience” and how Sweden reduced their smoking rates from 17% down to 5% using snus over a ten-year period.

Snus (pronounced snoos) is a moist tobacco pouch that is placed between the gum and upper lip. There has been no evidence to show that it has any links to cancer whatsoever.

Bengt Wiberg, the founder of Swedish-based company Sting Free Snus, and a highly regarded expert in the field of reduced harm strategy, says “a snus revolution is coming to the world”.

NZ Smokeless Tobacco Co is calling for the Government to take action and create access for less-harmful tobacco products like snus.

“We need to be taking this matter very seriously, as New Zealand is on the world stage for being a progressive country and this is an excellent opportunity to set the example and save thousands of lives in do so,” Illemann says.

“This will be a good show of faith by the Ministry of Health if they started taking action immediately.”

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