Seoul seeks smoking ban in all public facilities

Smoking may be banned in all restaurants and public facilities in the nation’s capital by 2020, as Seoul City seeks to make the metropolis smoke-free.

The city government said Monday that it will seek to ban smoking at all indoor public facilities in an effort to reduce the smoking rate and damage to people’s health from secondhand smoke.

According to a revised law to become effective Dec. 8, smoking will be prohibited at about 80,000 restaurants, cafes and bars which are over 150 square meters in size. The rule will be applied to smaller eateries in 2015.

“Small-sized restaurants and public facilities, where secondhand smoking is more serious, are exempt from the law for now. We’ll urge the central government to amend the law so that public places of all sizes, not only eateries but also all businesses, will become smoke free,” a city official said.

The city will also raise fines for people smoking in no-smoking zones: Currently, violators are fined 20,000-30,000 won according to the law, but starting March 21, local governments will have the authority to crack down on violators and impose fines. Seoul plans to raise the fines up to 100,000 won.

“More than 32 percent of Seoul citizens said they experienced indoor secondhand smoking. We hope such measures will lower the rate to 20 percent by 2020,” she said.

The city will also designate an additional 5,517 bus stops as no-smoking areas in 2013, and 1,305 areas around schools in 2014.

Along with the measures, Seoul City will urge the central government to raise cigarette prices, which it believes is one of the most effective ways of curbing the smoking rate. “In 2010, 44.2 percent of male adults were smokers. We hope to lower it to 29 percent, about the OECD average, by 2020,” she said.

It will also recommend the central government to ban cigarette sales near schools, because the average age when juveniles start smoking lowered to 12.8 years old in 2011 from 14 years old in 2005. <The Korea Times/Kim Rahn>