Figure: Presentations published on the British Government Network

Smoking has placed a heavy health and economic burden on the United Kingdom. The data show that two of every three British smokers die of smoke. While cigarettes can generate high tax revenues, the economic losses caused by smokers that are more likely to be sick and unemployed than non-smokers are also more alarming. In 2022, the British tax on tobacco was £11 billion, and the total expenditure on public finances related to volatility was as high as £21 billion, nearly two times the tax. “The cigarette is a net economic gain, but a secular myth.” Neil O’Brien said.

In order to help smokers stop smoking, the British Government has decided to promote electronic smoking. A large number of research evidence has confirmed that e-cigarettes are far less harmful than cigarettes, and high-quality evidence from international authoritative medical organizations such as Caquetá (Cochrane) indicates that e-cigarettes can be used for smoking cessation and that they are more effective than the Nigon substitution therapy.

Electronic smoke is not uncontested. Neil O’Brien indicated that, in the case of electronic smoke, which might attract minors, it was true that some of the one-time e-cigarettes in the colour, low prices and cartoons were marketed for children, and that the Government had set up special flight teams to severely combat those products. This is not inconsistent with the Government’s promotion of e-cigarettes to smokers.

“Electronic smoke is a double-edged sword. We will do our utmost to prevent minors from gaining access to electronic smoke, and we will also actively help adult smokers to stop smoking in civilian electronics.” He said.

Figure: Neil O’Brien, British Minister of Health

In April 2023, the British Government launched the first global “Electronic smoke re-engagement” programme to improve its smoking cessation rate through the free distribution of electronic smoke to smokers. Neil O’Brien introduced the plan to take the lead in successful piloting in poor areas with high smoking rates, followed by the Government providing free e-cigarettes and a range of behavioural support to 1 million British smokers.

An increasing number of British smokers are successfully stopping smoking through electronic smoke. The data show that, just a few weeks after the cessation of smoking, the pulmonary function level of smokers has increased by 10 per cent and the risk of diseases such as heart disease has also been significantly reduced. Smoking can also save about £2000 per year for every smoker, and in poor areas this means that local consumption levels will be effectively increased.

“Electronic smoke can play an important role in helping Governments achieve the 2030 smoke-free goal.” Neil O’Brien indicated that the current use of electronic smoke was not widespread and that additional measures were needed to enable adult smokers to switch to electronic smoke as soon as possible, since “they stop smoking today and do not appear on the bed next year”.

Wen / Gu 20

Takeout, as the topic of hot search in almost half a year in the past two years, has contracted almost all the attention of the national consumer economy.

Behind the unprecedented attention is that under the environment of the epidemic repeatedly affecting offline food, the main scene of catering business began to change: from the pre epidemic food dominated by food and supplemented by takeout, it gradually evolved into the post epidemic business scene dominated by takeout and supplemented by food.

The change of catering business scene has changed the status of Hall Food and takeout. While online catering consumption has become the main business source, takeout Commission has once become one of the focus of cost disputes in the catering industry.

One of the core of the dispute is: how high is the takeout commission?

The Commission understood by small and medium-sized catering businesses often refers to platform Commission. According to the financial report data, the Commission of meituan takeout in 2020 was only 13.6%, and 70% was used to pay for riders.

So what is the Commission actually belonging to the platform in a takeout order transaction? As a platform, meituan mainly plays the role of information matching between merchants’ meals and consumer demand. In the information matching link, the commercial essence of takeout is basically consistent with the e-commerce platform, providing trading venues and matching transactions, and charging a certain technology use fee accordingly.

According to the report of Zhongtai securities, according to the average commission amount, meituan’s average commission is significantly lower than tmall, at the same level as pinduoduo, with a fee rate of only about 2%.

Then why are there so many disputes in the takeout industry while there are few disputes in the e-commerce industry? On the one hand, compared with the nearly 30% penetration rate of e-commerce economy in the retail field, the takeout economy with only about 2% penetration rate in the catering industry is still in the early stage of industry development, and the relationship between merchants, platforms and consumers is still in the period of exploration and running in. Unlike the specialization and professionalism of e-commerce practitioners, takeout practitioners who are still in the early stage of development are mostly concentrated in the growth and learning period, which will inevitably lead to business misunderstandings and disputes.

On the other hand, in the past two years of repeated epidemic, subject to the impact of the general environment, small and medium-sized businesses, the main business body of takeout economy, have become the main pressure side. According to the data of Aurora Jiguang’s 2021 Research Report on catering takeout merchants, during 2020, the overall revenue of the catering industry decreased by 16.6% year-on-year. The epidemic factors made the catering industry decline for the first time in nearly eight years. Facing the pressure of experience, most small and medium-sized businesses with poor anti risk ability will transfer the business pressure to the platform service party, resulting in the misunderstanding of commission.

For the platform, as the hub linking all ecological parties of takeout, it is natural to consider the development status of all ecological stakeholders and tide over the difficulties with them. Ten days after the national development and Reform Commission issued the notice on several policies on promoting the recovery and development of difficult industries in the service industry, meituan gave assistance measures for difficult businesses.

In March 1st, the US delegation said through its WeChat official account that it will launch six measures to assist small and medium businesses affected by the epidemic, and help small and medium-sized businesses from two aspects of reducing the profits and increasing revenue.

Among them, in terms of cost reduction, meituan proposed measures such as halving the Commission for small and medium-sized merchants affected by the epidemic to reduce the pressure on merchants, further promote the scope of rate transparency, and achieve cost cutting and pain relief.

In terms of income increase, it will provide “takeout housekeeper service” free of charge for merchants with insufficient online operation ability, as well as takeout order receiving equipment such as cloud printer and meal treasure, and will hold 100 merchant talks to continuously improve the operation ability of open source hematopoiesis for merchants.

Out of the misunderstanding of commission, how to grasp the Commission preferential policy of this platform and quickly make blood after pain relief is obviously a required course for catering operation.

Cost reduction and throttling are just painkillers

In terms of cost reduction and expenditure reduction, meituan mainly launched two measures: for merchants with difficulties in epidemic areas, the Commission will be halved and capped at 1 yuan per order; For small and medium-sized merchants with operating difficulties, the Commission is capped at 5%. The specific implementation scope and object of the observation measures can be found that it is mainly aimed at small and medium-sized merchants affected by the epidemic and difficult to operate, so as to reduce the flexible operation cost within the effective time.

Different from the three high costs of “rent, manpower and ingredients” in the traditional catering industry, takeout had no clear effective operating cost before. In May 2021, meituan takeout launched the rate transparency reform, which greatly improved the clarity of takeout operating costs.

The fees paid by merchants to the platform are clearly defined as technical service fees and performance service fees, of which the technical service fees are the platform income, that is, the actual platform Commission. The performance service fee is mainly the rider distribution service fee, which is mainly used to pay the distribution cost. Only when the merchant chooses the platform distribution, this part of the fee will be generated, which improves the flexibility of the operating cost.

First of all, transparency allows businesses to clarify the cost structure of each takeout order, know where the money is spent, and resolve the misunderstanding of commission. For example, in the view of Mr. Xiong, a Shaoguan merchant who operates twister toast, doublemays big wave puff shop and Renren twenty-four flavor coffee shop, “we also found that the delivery cost of many orders to riders accounts for almost the majority of the overall cost, and the actual charge of each order on the platform is often a few cents.”

Secondly, after the rate reform, for Mr. Xiong, the overall service fee expenditure has been reduced again on the previous basis. According to the data, in the survey of takeout merchants who have completed the rate transparency reform, 85% of them believe that the rate reform can bring a positive effect to the catering industry; More than 50% of businesses said they could really feel the benefits; 35% of merchants said they would increase the proportion of investment in takeout business in the future.

In addition, unlike the rent occupying the main operating cost of a store, which belongs to fixed cost expenditure, the Commission in takeout operation is often closely related to orders. Without orders, there is no commission. Commission is a flexible expenditure in operating costs. The essence is pay on demand based on digital economy, which also greatly improves the effectiveness of operating costs.

Moreover, the traditional operating costs often come from the maintenance of human relations. Take the main operating cost rent as an example, because there is no clear way of supervision, it is often easy to rise.

For example, for the Northeast dumpling merchants in Nanchang, a store in Wuhan signed a contract for 3800 yuan for a year six months ago. As a result, after operating for half a year, the landlord saw that the business was good and asked for a price increase to 4200 yuan,

For the children’s thermal insulation straw cup within the scope of this recall, due to the sharp angle between the cup cover and the latch and the lack of relevant safety warning signs of the product, when the thermal insulation cup is not clamped back after the cover is opened, the upper cover may be closed downward and touch the children’s face, which may have potential safety hazards.

Catering Magician (China) household products Co., Ltd. will replace consumers with brand-new cup covers that meet the safety requirements free of charge by adding safety warning signs on the products, so as to eliminate potential safety hazards.

Users can log in to the official website of shanmagician (China) household products Co., Ltd. to check whether the products they hold are within the affected scope, or learn about the specific situation through the customer service hotline (4008282888). In addition, you can also log in to the website DPAC samr. gov.cn、www.recall. org. Cn, learn more and reflect defect clues.

Russian media quoted medynski as saying that the members of the Russian delegation participating in the second round of negotiations remain unchanged. Russia and Ukraine jointly decided to hold talks in the forest of belowege. The personnel of the Ukrainian delegation have left Kiev and will arrive at the negotiation site on the 3rd local time. The Russian army will provide a safe passage for the Ukrainian delegation in Ukraine, and the Belarusian special forces will ensure the safety of the Ukrainian delegation in Belarus.

Medynski said that in the first round of negotiations, Russia and Ukraine put forward their respective positions, and Russia put forward some suggestions on an immediate ceasefire. The Ukrainian delegation reached some understandings on the issue of principle, but the two sides needed time.

In addition, the Ukrainian news agency quoted the Ukrainian President’s office on the 2nd as saying that the Ukrainian delegation was on the way to the belowege forest. The Ukrainian President’s office did not disclose more details.

On February 28, the Russian and Ukrainian delegations held the first negotiation after the Russian special military operation in Gomel state, Belarus. After the talks, merkinski told the media that during the negotiations, Russian and Ukrainian representatives discussed all the topics on the agenda in detail and found some topics on which the two sides predicted to reach a consensus position. The two sides agreed to continue negotiations.