Advertising, promotion and sponsorship
A comprehensive ban on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship, should cover:
• all advertising and promotion, as well as sponsorship without exemption.
• direct and indirect advertising, promotion and sponsorship.
• acts that aim at promotion and acts that have or are likely to have a promotional effect.
• promotion of tobacco products and the use of tobacco.
• commercial communications and commercial recommendations and actions.
Display
To ensure that points of sale of tobacco products do not have any promotional elements, Parties should introduce a total ban on any display and on the visibility of tobacco products at points of sale, including fixed retail outlets and street vendors. Only the textual listing of products and their prices, without any promotional elements, would be allowed. As for all aspects of Article 13, the ban should also apply in ferries, airplanes, ports and airports.
Vending machines
Vending machines should be banned, because they constitute by their very presence a means of advertising or promotion under the terms of the Convention.
Packaging and product design
Packaging and product design are important elements of advertising and promotion. The effect of advertising or promotion on packaging can be eliminated if plain packaging is required Packaging, individual cigarettes or other tobacco products should carry no advertising or promotion, including design features that make products attractive.
Internet sales
Internet sales of tobacco should be banned as they inherently involve tobacco advertising and promotion.
Brand stretching
Parties should ban “brand stretching” and “brand sharing”, as they are means of tobacco advertising and promotion.
Socially services
The Parties should ban contributions from tobacco companies to any other entity for “socially responsible causes”, as this is a form of sponsorship. Publicity given to “socially responsible” business practices of the tobacco industry should be banned, as it constitutes advertising and promotion.
Product placement
Parties should take particular measures concerning the depiction of tobacco in entertainment media products, including requiring certification that no benefits have been received for any tobacco depictions, prohibiting the use of identifiable tobacco brands or imagery, requiring anti-tobacco advertisements and implementing a ratings or classification system that takes tobacco depictions into account.
