SANTA CRUZ, Ilocos Sur—“Local governments should take a second look at the national law regulating smoking regulation and reconcile their actions with it.”

This is the reaction of Philip Morris Fortune Tobacco Corp. (PMFTC) president Chris Nelson to the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) antismoking campaign that was implemented starting July 1.

The MMDA banned smoking in bus terminals, waiting sheds, schools, hospitals, recreational places and public utility vehicles.

Nelson said the ban is in contradiction to the national law that does not impose a total ban on smoking, but regulates it.

“The law simply said that smoking is regulated. It calls on the designation of smoking areas but did not ban it entirely.”

Ordinances of local governments, including that of the MMDA, that ban smoking is a contradiction of the nationally issued law already effective in the entire country and there is no need to issue another one that deviates from the provisions of Republic Act (RA) 9211 that took effect in 2003, Nelson said.

He said the law identified places where one can smoke and not smoke, adding that the national law is supposed to look after all stakeholders, and not just focus on two sectors, like the cigarette manufacturers and the tobacco farmers who live on producing the said product.

Nelson said the important message is that the law passed in 2003 is successful because it came about as a result of the consolidated ideas of the country’s leaders, agreed that designated smoking areas be established.

“Smoking outdoor should not be prevented as it is not part of the contemplation of the law.”

He called on those who drafted the MMDA smoking ban and the local ordinances to “follow the national law and respect both sides.”

In implementing the ban, MMDA environmental protection officers wearing light-green shirts and brown vests have been deployed to various points in Metro Manila to arrest violators of the ban.

People caught violating the MMDA smoking ban will be charged with a criminal case and penalized with fines ranging from P500 to P1,000 for the first offense, P1,000  to  P5,000 for the second, and P10,000 for the third offense.

The MMDA imposed the ban in accordance with Section 5 of RA 9211, or the Tobacco Regulation Act of 2003; and RA 8749, or the Clean Air Act of 1999.

Nelson said he has no issue with the national law which is already in effect because it does not ban, but regulates, smoking and recognizes that there are people who choose to smoke inasmuch as there are those who chose not to.

PMFTC, he said, did not react on local ordinances considering its minimal effect to the industry but it cannot simply sit down when the MMDA imposed the ban in Metro Manila.

He said representatives of the tobacco industry will go to the cities and towns in the country to help educate their leaders on the national law and encourage them to comply with it.

He added that the industry will also ask the national leadership’s help in communicating to the local governments the existing national law on smoking.

Killing the tobacco industry, Nelson said, will also kill the almost 50,000 tobacco farmers.

In addition, Nelson said the tobacco industry paid some P31.6 billion to the government by way of excise taxes in 2010. The amount, he said, is 22 percent more than what the government had estimated for the year and 32 percent more than the previous year’s collection.

Nelson said industry leaders will not stop the antismoking advocates from what they are doing but they will also do what is needed to protect the tobacco industry.

Despite the growing campaign to stop smoking, the National Tobacco Administration (NTA) recorded a 26- percent increase in the country’s total tobacco production in 2010, or an additional 15,195 metric tons of tobacco compared with 2009. 
NTA Administrator Edgardo Zaragoza said tobacco production grew from 58,572 metric tons in 2009 to 73,767 metric tons in 2010, for a growth of 13 percent.

The NTA has also reported that the area planted with tobacco also increased by 16 percent from the previous 32,871 hectares.

The increases in production and land area planted generated 6,815 additional jobs in tobacco-producing provinces.