The biggest country of origin for tobacco imported into the United Kingdom was Poland. In 2022, the country supplied tobacco worth nearly 180 million British pounds to the UK. Lithuania and the Netherlands followed, with imports from these countries amounting to 80 and 65 million pounds respectively.
Tobacco trade and retail
Imports of tobacco and tobacco substitutes to the UK amounted to 411 million US Dollars in 2021. Most
tobacco is produced in China, Brazil and India. Together these countries produced over 3.6 million metric tons of tobacco in 2021.
In the UK over 21 billion British pounds of revenue were generated with the
retail sale of tobacco in 2023.
Smoking in the UK
In the different countries of the UK, around 14 to 16
percent of the population smoked in 2019. Noticeable is that the percentage of people who never smoked in Northern Ireland was more than two percent higher than in England and about three percent higher when compared to Scotland and Wales.
Smoking in the UK, as well as in other countries of the world, is more common among males than females.