Country Overview
Key Facts
Number of Employees: Approximately 25
Main Brands:
Marlboro, Parliament, Chesterfield, L&M, Bond Street, Red & White
Welcome to Philip Morris International’s affiliates in the Baltics. Philip Morris Lithuania was established in 1993 when we acquired the major shareholding of the State Tobacco Factory and established our headquarters office in Vilnius. In 1996 we established Oü Philip Morris Eesti based in Tallinn. In 1997 we opened a representative office in Latvia and in 2000 - SIA “Philip Morris Latvia”, based in Riga.
In 1997, we also opened a new manufacturing facility in Klaipėda, Lithuania the first ‘greenfield’ project of its kind in the Baltics and in 2000, we started producing Marlboro. We employ approximately 550 people across the three Baltic countries.
In the Baltics, we focus our corporate contributions and community support on social programs addressing the most pressing human and societal needs, including hunger and extreme poverty, education, and domestic violence prevention.
Smoking and Health
Tobacco products, including cigarettes, are dangerous and addictive. There is overwhelming medical and scientific evidence that smoking causes lung cancer, heart disease, emphysema, and other serious diseases.
Addiction
All tobacco products are addictive. It can be very difficult to quit smoking, but this should not deter smokers who want to quit from trying to do so.
Secondhand Smoke
Public health officials have concluded that secondhand smoke from cigarettes causes serious diseases in non-smokers, including lung cancer and heart disease. We believe the public health conclusions on secondhand smoke are sufficient to support smoking restrictions in public places.
Effective Regulation
Philip Morris International (PMI) supports comprehensive regulation of tobacco products based on the principle of harm reduction.
To be effective, tobacco regulatory policy must be evidence-based, apply to all tobacco products, and should take into account the views of all legitimate stakeholders including public health authorities, government finance authorities, tobacco manufacturers, and other members of the tobacco supply chain. Regulatory policy must consider the potential to trigger adverse consequences which undermine public health objectives, such as increasing the demand for illicit cigarettes.
While we support comprehensive, effective tobacco regulation, we do not support regulation that prevents adults from buying and using tobacco products or that imposes unnecessary impediments to the operation of the legitimate tobacco market. In that regard, we oppose measures such as generic packaging, point of sale display bans, total bans on communications to adult consumers, and bans on the use of all ingredients in tobacco products.