> Aren't US tobacco brand sales growing in Asian markets by significant
> amount? John Thornton
My travels around Asia would lead me to believe that even the heavy-smoking E. Asian countries are starting to be down on tobacco. In Japan the population is not growing much (I think it's going to peak at about 130 million), and life-long smokers don't tend to live so long. Many American brands are no longer owned by American companies, and consolidation took place to achieve growth in profits across premium brands, with BAT and JT emerging as the biggest players (I think, I am just using my memory here and will investigate it a bit more and correct myself if I am wrong). I'm not sure the premium brands-better profits strategy holds anymore, and JT's quest for profits in other areas as taken it into pharmaceuticals, soft drinks, the image of which is supposed to be concerned with 'health', believe it or not. I'm not sure about the strategy of getting young Asians in 'young' Asian countries (i.e., countries with development tragectories and growing populations) to smoke, since it's limited by them not being over-consumers and over-spenders on anything, since they are poor compared to the consumers of S. Korea, Taiwan, and Japan. I guess China would be the wildcard, not Philippines or Indonesia.
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