Cigarette & Tobacco Manufacturing Industry

What is the Cigarette & Tobacco Manufacturing Industry? Companies within this industry manufacture cigarettes, cigars, smoking and chewing tobacco, and reconstituted tobacco. Tobacco manufacturers acquire their raw materials from tobacco growers, tobacco stemmers and redriers, paper and fiber manufacturers and then process these into tobacco products. The final products are then sold to wholesalers and retailers. The Cigarette Manufacturing Industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in cigarette, cigar and cigarette filter manufacturing. Products manufactured include Virginia cigarettes, blend-type cigarettes, cigars and filter rods. This industry does not include the manufacturing of fiber tows for cigarettes.

What is the Cigarette & Tobacco Products Wholesaling Industry? Companies within this industry acquire packaged cigarettes and other tobacco products from manufacturers and sell the goods to various retail stores such as supermarkets and convenience stores, specialized tobacco stores and bars. They may also sell to other wholesalers. The sales and distribution offices of tobacco product manufacturers are included in this industry. What is the Tobacco Growing Industry? Farms in this industry grow tobacco leaf. Tobacco farmers purchase inputs, such as fertilizers, agricultural chemicals, pesticides, plant seeds, plant bulbs, and curing fuel, from farm supply and other wholesaling industries. The tobacco leaf is exported or sold to domestic tobacco product manufacturers.

What is the Global Tobacco Manufacturing Industry? Companies in this industry manufacture cigarettes, cigars, smoking and chewing tobacco, and other tobacco products such as snuff and bidis. This industry also includes tobacco stemming and redrying establishments, which buy various types of tobacco leaf from farmers and prepare the leaf for use by cigarette manufacturers, which may be separate enterprises or under the same ownership. Tobacco is grown in over 125 countries around the world, on over 4 million hectares of land, of which over a quarter is in China alone. The global tobacco crop is worth approximately $20 billion, a small fraction of the total amount generated from the sale of manufactured tobacco products around the world.

Cigarettes Manufacturing Commercially manufactured cigarettes are simple objects consisting mainly of a tobacco blend, paper, PVA, and also a cellulose acetate. Paper: The paper for holding the tobacco blend may vary in porosity to allow ventilation of the burning ember or contain materials that control the burning rate of the cigarette and stability of the produced ash. The burning agents in cigarette paper are responsible for fires and reducing them would be a simple and effective means of dramatically reducing the ignition propensity of cigarettes. The burn rate of cigarette paper is regulated through the application of different forms of micro crystalline cellulose to the paper. Cigarette paper has been specially engineered by creating bands of different porosity to create "fire-safe" cigarettes like Marlboro Gold. These cigarettes have a reduced idle burning speed which allows them to self-extinguish.

Tobacco blend: The process of blending gives the end product a consistent taste from batches of tobacco grown in different areas of a country that may change in flavor profile from year to year due to different environmental conditions. Each cigarette's tobacco blend is made mainly from the leaves of flue-cured brightleaf, burley tobacco, and oriental tobacco. These leaves are selected, processed, and aged prior to blending and filling. The processing of brightleaf and burley tobaccos for tobacco leaf "strips" produces several by-products such as leaf stems, tobacco dust, and tobacco leaf pieces ("small laminate").

Additives: Various additives are combined into the shredded tobacco product mixtures, with humectants such as propylene glycol or glycerol, as well as flavouring products and enhancers such as cocoa solids, licorice, tobacco extracts, and various sugars, which are known collectively as "casings". The leaf tobacco will then be shredded, along with a specified amount of small laminate, expanded tobacco, BL, RL, ES and IS. A perfume-like flavour/fragrance, called the "topping" or "toppings", which is most often formulated by flavor companies, will then be blended into the tobacco mixture to improve the consistency in flavour and taste of the cigarettes associated with a certain brand name. Additionally, they replace lost flavours due to the repeated wetting and drying used in processing the tobacco. Finally the tobacco mixture will be filled into cigarettes tubes and packaged.