China has amended its tobacco monopoly law to extend to e-cigarettes in order to step up the regulation of the fast growing vaping industry, reports Reuters.

The tobacco industry in China is controlled by a government monopoly and the sale of e-cigarettes to minors was already outlawed in 2018 with a ban on online sales following in 2019.
Since then, the sale of e-cigarettes to adults has been in a regulatory grey area with regulators in China appealing to the government to bring rules governing the sale of e-cigarettes and other NGPs in line with those for combustible cigarettes, reports Reuters. Premier Li Keqiang has now signed off on the cabinet order, which comes into effect immediately.
With a huge market potential, a large number of Chinese e-cigarette companies have emerged including market leader RLX Technology Inc. The company stated on its official WeChat account that it would heed the rules and make any required changes, reports Reuters.