The electronic cigarette market is on the course of gradual advancement despite the lack of uniformity regarding its regulations in the global market. The electronic cigarette, or e-cigarette, is a battery-operated device used to emulate the overall conventional experience of smoking, by emitting variable doses of nicotine and non-nicotine solutions that are inhaled instead of burning tobacco.
Extensive debates are taking place regarding the issue of regulatory policies concerning e-cigarettes, more so as the health risks of these products still remain uncertain. National and international legislations on e-cigarettes vary considerably. E-cigarettes are being summarily banned for public smoking in an increasing number of places in the U.S, as the question of their potentially harmful side-effects surges on. Some feel that the ban is baseless due to the fundamental differences between an electronic and a tobacco cigarette.
However, many are asserting that the e-cigarette is a latest form of technology which is structurally different from that of a traditional cigarette, and hence, the industry should not be coerced into abiding the existing tobacco laws or paying tobacco taxes. The e-cigarette is currently taxed at the normal sales tax rate, wherein a pack will be tax levied at $0.40.
On one hand, the tobacco companies are making solid efforts into securing their position in the market by introducing new brands; the pharmaceutical industries seem to be opposing the growing propensity of e-cigarettes in the upcoming market. As per the market analysis done by BIS Research on the global e-cigarette industry, “The demand for e-cigarettes escalated since 2012 and is anticipated to grow over $50 billion by 2025 at an estimated CAGR of 22.36% from 2015 to 2025.”
Analysts at BIS Research believe that the market will witness a staggering growth until 2017, by when it is believed that most of the regulatory and policy agenda will shape up into a more established framework of action. With these policies being finally built up in innumerable countries from its nascency, the onset of the coming years is expected to showcase a more stable and concrete picture of the e-cigarette industry in the international market.