The Ministry of Industry and Trade has recently submitted to the Government a draft decree on sanctioning of administrative violations related to liquor and cigarette trading.
The draft paper, which has 35 articles arranged in seven chapters, targets all organizations and individuals, both Vietnamese and foreign, that commit acts of unintentionally or intentionally violating legal provisions on state management in liquor and trading in the territory, exclusive economic zone and continental shelf of Vietnam.
Administrative violations in liquor and cigarette trading include violations of regulations on food safety and hygiene, production licenses, trading conditions and licenses; violations of import regulations and regulations on product quality standards, product labels and stamps; violations of regulations on advertisement, environmental protection; infringements of intellectual property rights; and violations of special regulations in the domain of liquor and cigarette trading.
Particularly, the draft decree imposes a fine of between VND 200,000 and 500,000 to those who sell liquor or cigarette products to people aged under 18.
The highest fine level of VND 60 million would apply to acts of producing liquors or cigarettes in infringement of rights to patents, industrial designs, marks, geographical indications and acts of applying processes in infringement of patents.
Meanwhile, a fine of up to VND 50 million would be imposed on those who produce liquor on an industrial scale or producing cigarettes with expired permits or without permits or falsify, modify, lease, lend, transfer or sell and purchase permits for industrial production of liquor or cigarette production permits; those who import liquor or cigarette products without lawful import documents, import or entrust the import of liquor products without liquor production permits or liquor wholesale permits, import liquor or cigarette products of illegal origin or sell materials for the production of finished liquor products to enterprises without liquor production permits; and those who produce cigarettes in excess of 10% of their permitted annual production capacity or produce cigarettes in contravention of the strategy on tobacco industry development.-