New Zealand is set to ban the advertising and promotion of vapes as part of a major overhaul of vaping laws.
Under the new legislation, announced by the Ministry of Health, vapes and their packaging will no longer be allowed to be on display in general retail shops. This includes advertising and display in online stores and in automated vending machines.
Specialist vape shops must not display the products so they can be seen from outside their business, such as in a window.
These shops (and their online stores) will also no longer be able to give away free vaping products, discount vaping products at retail, offer rewards, cash rebates or gifts for the purchase of vaping products, or offer lotteries or games to people who buy vaping products.
Smoking and Vaping Bill before Parliament
The new rules are the latest changes to come under the ‘Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products Amendment Bill (no. 2), which is currently before Parliament.
The Bill includes four main amendments aimed at preventing youth vaping: a ban on disposable vapes; higher fines for sales to under-18s; restrictions on how retailers can display vapes, such as outside specialist vape retailers and from inside stores such as dairies and petrol stations; and a ban on selling vapes near early childhood education centres.
Under rules already in place, general retail shops in New Zealand are prohibited from encouraging customers to use vapes, notifying them about product availability or promoting their sale.
These shops can still identify products that are available to buy, and their prices, and can encourage smokers to switch to less harmful products.
Striking a balance with helping smokers quit
Debating the Bill in the Commons this week, Associate Health Minister Casey Costello said it was important to strike a balance between deterring young people from vaping and acknowledging the role of vapes in helping adult smokers to quit.
She said: “I think it's important, when we talk about vaping and its tool, we can't ignore the impact. And you can see in the graphs that have been referred to numerous times that we did see a massive drop in smoking rates from about 2018.
“And the differential that occurred, at that point, was that vaping had hit the markets, and we started ending up with a much higher drop-off of smoking than we had seen previously.
“So we're not, by any means, suggesting that this is a way of promoting vaping as a solution for young people. That's exactly what we're trying to prevent.
“We're trying to ensure that under this vaping environment, we send clear messages that it is not for young people. We don't want young people to vape, and we will continue to push on that language.
“So we're doing a piece of work that we're very keen to make sure has some tighter controls in place by the end of the year.
“There is further work coming, and there is further opportunity to do more in this space, but there is no denying that vaping is a less harmful product for smokers, and, therefore, we recognise it as a tool that has contributed to the smoking drop-off that we've seen.”
New Zealand has a target of becoming smoke-free - which means a smoking rate of less than five per cent - by 2025.
When announcing the Bill earlier this year, Costello said: “The Government is committed to achieving Smokefree 2025 and to stopping young people from vaping and this Bill will ensure we are able to protect our young people from vaping whilst continuing to support adult smokers to quit by maintaining access to vapes as a cessation tool.
“I hope that public submissions through the select committee process ensure that we have a practical regime that achieves both objectives.
“We want to get rid of the vapes that are most popular among young people and ensure that effective cessation products remain available for people to quit smoking and not return to smoking.”
