Aldi used to smoke 40 packs of cigarettes a day when he was 2. Fortunately, he was able to kick the habit eventually.
Ever wonder why one of the most famous contemporary Indonesians is Aldi Rizal, the infamous smoking baby pictured above?
Part of the reason why underage smoking is such a problem in Indonesia is because merchants don’t hesitate to sell cigarettes to kids under the age of 18, even if the law prohibits them from doing so.
A new survey by the Indonesian Consumers Foundation (YLKI) found that, disgracefully, 68% of shops still sell cigarettes to minors.
“Only 32% refuse to sell cigarettes to children,” said Tulus Abadi of the YLKI yesterday, as quoted by Kompas.
The survey was carried out between February and March of this year in four major Indonesian cities: Jakarta, Surabaya, Medan and Denpasar. They found that even shops that initially forbade selling cigarettes to children eventually cave in to keep up with their competitors who sell cigarettes to children.
The YLKI also found cases where the parents themselves instructed their children to buy cigarettes for them.
Whatever laws we have against underage smoking, it’s always going to be a problem if society doesn’t see any problem with our children being surrounded by cigarettes and smoking.
