Blog

Tobacconomics Research World Tour: Second stop—Indonesia

Last week, we took you along with us on our trip to Karachi, Pakistan, for SPDC’s seminar on the “Macroeconomic Impacts of Tobacco Use in Pakistan.” This week, we will be discussing a recent event organized by our partner, Prakarsa, in Jakarta, Indonesia, held on March 27th. The purpose of this meeting was to launch and present their new research: “The Illicit Cigarette Trade in Indonesia.” We are excited to disseminate these noteworthy findings, so let’s begin! Read More

Tobacconomics Research World Tour: First stop—Pakistan

During the month of April, we’ll be taking a world tour of recent research in Pakistan; Indonesia; Romania; Chile; and Bangladesh—all delivered by Tobacconomics think tank partners. In last month’s series, we explored our approach to think tank capacity building through a series of blogs. This month, we’ll be sharing the proof of concept to highlight several dissemination events that have taken place in the last several weeks. Let’s begin in Karachi! Read More

The Tobacconomics Approach to Think Tank Capacity Building: Current Research from the First Year and the Way Forward, & Future Research

Over the past three weeks, we have taken to our blog to reflect on our first two years of the think tank capacity building project, “Accelerating Progress on Tobacco Taxes in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.” In this series, we have defined our purpose and direction for think tank capacity building. A few questions we initially asked ourselves were: Why capacity building? What capacities are we seeking to build? The answers to those questions lay the foundation to formulate our purpose and six core competencies of analysis in the economics of tobacco control. Read More

The Tobacconomics Approach to Think Tank Capacity Building: Our Research Process

If you are a new reader to this series, we have already released the first two blogs: the ‘what’ and ‘why’, and the ‘who’, ‘where’, and ‘how’ on our approach to think tank capacity building. We discussed our reasoning for capacity building in the first place, what capacities we sought to build, and our scoping process in finding the think tank partners we work with today on the project, “Accelerating Progress on Tobacco Taxes in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.” In this blog, we will be discussing our research process: how we worked with partners and sought input from policy makers and advocates to identify evidence gaps, selected research topics, assessed data availability and training needs, and ensured quality research and timely delivery—all with the goal of increasing evidence-based policymaking on tobacco taxation. Read More

The Tobacconomics Approach to Think Tank Capacity-Building: The ‘Why' and ‘What’

During the month of March, we’ll be sharing a series of blogs to explain the think tank capacity building project: “Accelerating Progress on Tobacco Taxes in Low? and Middle?Income Countries,” which is funded through the Bloomberg Initiative To Reduce Tobacco Use. You can find a summary of the project here on the Tobacconomics website, but in short, this project aims to build the capacity of economic and fiscal policy think tanks to produce and disseminate high-quality research on the economics of tobacco taxation. We began the project two years ago and in that time, we have established partnerships with 22 think tanks in 17 countries. This series of blogs will explain the “who, what, when, where, why and how” of our team’s approach to capacity building on the economics of tobacco control, including our ‘core competencies’ model, the scoping process, research process and results thus far, lessons learned from our first grant cycle, and lastly, future work. Read More

New Collection of Papers Explores the Economics of NCDs

A new special collection of PLOS ONE, “Economic Cases for NCD Prevention and Control: A Global Perspective,” edited by Rachel Nugent (RTI International), Muhammad Jami Hussein (U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and Tobacconomics Director, Frank Chaloupka, was launched at the annual Prince Mahidol Award Conference in Bangkok this week. Read More

UIC Think Tank Partners Make the Case for Returning to a Two-tiered Taxation Structure in Pakistan at the 34th Annual Conference of the Pakistan Society of Development Economists

Pakistan’s tobacco tax structure has undergone many changes in the past decade. Prior to 2013, the country had a highly complex three-tier Federal Excise Duty (FED) on cigarettes, with specific taxes on lower brands, ad-valorem taxes on premium brands levied as a percentage of retail price, and a combination of the two on medium brands. The tax structure was simplified in 2013, abolishing the ad-valorem component, making it a two-tier system instead. However, in 2017, a third tier was again introduced. At the 34th Annual Conference of the Pakistan Society of Development Economics last month, UIC think tank partners, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) and the Social Policy and Development Centre (SPDC), launched two new research reports that make the case for a more simplified tobacco tax structure in Pakistan. Read More

Southeastern European Think Tanks Present Research at Regional Conference

Culminating a year-long investigation of tobacco taxation and its impact on consumer behaviors in the SEE region, Tobacconomics think tank partners in the region from Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia met in Belgrade with policy makers and public health advocates from the region to present their breakthrough findings and recommendations. Read More