Jakarta – The National Commission for Child Protection urged the House of Representatives on Tuesday to pressure the government to restrict the sale of single cigarettes, in a bid to protect children from tobacco.
"Nowadays, cigarette firms are targeting children (anyone below 18 years old) in commercials on television, posters, billboards, and even in the sponsorship of music (and) sporting events," commission Secretary General Arist Merdeka Sirait said during a hearing with the House's Commission VIII, which oversees religious, social and women's empowerment issues.
"Allowing downstream distributors to sell single cigarettes for only Rp 500 (5.5 US cents) each eases children's access to tobacco," he added.
A student who joined the National Commission at the hearing said the price of a single cigarette was the same as for one pisang goreng (fried banana), making them affordable for children.
A 2006 study by the Global Youth Tobacco Survey showed 14.4 percent of the country's children aged between 13 and 15 years old had been offered free cigarettes by manufacturers, despite the practice being prohibited by a 2003 government regulation. As many as 93 percent of the surveyed children had seen cigarette commercials on billboards and 83 percent had seen them in newspapers and magazines.
According to a 2006 survey by the Drug and Food Monitoring Agency, 14,249 cigarette commercials appeared in the mass media and communal places throughout the country during that year.
The number of smokers aged below 19 years increased from 69 percent in 2001 to 78 percent in 2004, proving that child smoking was a widespread problem, Arist said.
The government said last week it would start imposing retail price increases for cigarettes in March and raise the special tax on tobacco products in July, despite mounting protests from cigarette makers.
Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati stated in December that the retail price of cigarettes would rise by seven percent from March 1 this year.
Cigarette producers will also be required to pay a special tax – on top of standard tobacco excise duties – of Rp 7 per cigarette in the case of cigarette firms with an annual production of more than 2 billion cigarettes (so-called category one firms); Rp 5 per cigarette for firms with an annual production of between 500 million and 2 billion cigarettes (category two firms); and Rp 3 per cigarette for firms with an annual production of less than 500 million cigarettes a year (category three firms).
Currently, excise duty is imposed at a rate of 40 percent of the official price for category one firms; 36 percent for category two firms; and 26 percent for category three firms.
Arist said the government's price rises did not go far enough. "The country sells cigarettes at lower prices compared to neighboring countries in Southeast Asia. To address this gap, a pack of cigarettes should be sold for at least Rp 20,000," he added.
The chairman of Commission VIII, Hasrul Azwar, said he would put the National Commission's suggestions on his agenda for meetings with the government.