Cigarettes will be officially sold in post offices in Russia, pro-government daily Izvestia reported Monday.
According to an agreement reached between Russia's national mail service Russian Post and four tobacco companies — British American Tobacco, Philip Morris, Japan Tobacco International and Imperial Tobacco — cigarettes will be sold in 30,000 post offices across the country.
Russian Post has 42,000 outlets throughout the country, and many of them are in small villages that have supermarkets or even small kiosks, the postal services said in an official statement announcing the deal.
“This [the agreement] will provide easier access to the high-quality essential commodities for those living in rural areas,” said Russian Post, according to the official statement quoted by Izvestia.
Antitabak Coalition chairperson Daria Khalturina sees more harm than good in the deal.
Khalturina told Izvestia that such an expansion of tobacco distribution contradicts with the state program aimed to decrease the amount of smokers.
“All we can do is just wait and see if cigarette trade in post offices end up with growth in cigarette consumption,” Khalturina said.
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