I have been following the debate on the proposed sale of small packs for cigarettes since it started and to be honest, I wish the proposal had been made earlier.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not a smoker but I used to work in one of the tobacco factories until I was retrenched recently.

The company told me my retrenchment was due to the declining demand for cigarettes as the illegal cigarette trade was very big in the market.

The bosses told me the factory at present produced slightly over half the number of cigarettes it used to churn out compared to 10-15 years ago. They explained that they had no choice but to close shop.

According to my rough estimation, 1,000 staff lost their jobs due to the closure of tobacco factories and printing companies this year alone.

But let’s get this point across first. Everyone knows smoking is risky. It is harmful to the health. Nobody denies this and NGOs in the country are calling for the health ministry to impose more regulations.

The sale of small cigarette packs was permitted before 2010. I was told the cigarettes came in packs of 14, 10 and 7.

Now let’s look at some facts and figures on whether banning small packs will deter new smokers or young smokers from taking up the habit, as many against the smaller packs have claimed.

The figures below were obtained from the Ministry of Health’s National Health & Morbidity Survey 2006, Global Adult Tobacco Survey 2011, National Health & Morbidity Survey 2015, and Tobacco and E-cigarette Survey Among Malaysian Adolescents 2016.

Number of smokers

• 2006 > 2.7 million smokers
• 2011 > 4.7 million smokers
• 2015 > 5.0 million smokers

Average sticks consumed per day

• 2006 > 10 cigarettes
• 2011 > 14 cigarettes
• 2015 > 60% smoked 15 cigarettes and above

Youth smokers

• 2006 > 180,000 youth smokers in Malaysia
• 2016 > 413,000 youth smokers in Malaysia

If what the NGOs say is true, the discontinuation of small packs since 2010 should have seen the number of smokers decrease, the number of cigarette sticks consumed per day decrease and the number of youth smokers decrease. Instead these numbers have increased even after the discontinuation of the small packs.

I am already out of a factory job. But I am concerned for the people who are still working in the tobacco industry. I know they worry about their future if the illegal cigarette trade continues to eat into the legitimate industry’s pie.

I hope the government will give this some consideration because it may just save hundreds of jobs.

And to those against the proposal – do check your facts first and keep your emotions out of it.

“Retrenched Worker” is an FMT reader.

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.