China tobacco sales in first fall in two decades

The Financial Times reports the amount of tobacco sold in China fell last year for the first time in more than 20 years, as a government health drive and rise in excise taxes began to take effect. China has long bucked the trend of falling tobacco volumes: in the past ten years, while worldwide sales have dropped 2%, the amount of tobacco sold in China has increased 21% to 2.5tn cigarettes a year. But after rising 2.4% in 2014, Chinese tobacco consumption dropped 2.4% last year, the first fall since 1995, according to data from Euromonitor. This is equivalent to a drop of about 60bn cigarettes.