Thailand may lose golf tournament because of alcohol ad ban
Thailand may lose golf tournament because of alcohol ad ban
BANGKOK: — Thailand could lose the chance to host next year’s Johnnie Walker Classic golf tournament after the new government banned alcohol advertisements, the brand’s local importer said Tuesday.
Riche Monde (Bangkok), local distributor of Johnnie Walker Scotch whisky, said the decision to let Thailand host the three-day event in Phuket was under review because of the government’s ban on alcohol ads.
“The Thai unit hoped the golf tournament would bring tourists back to Phuket, but now our headquarters is rethinking as we cannot put advertisements on the event,” said Wimonwan Udomphorn, vice president of Riche Monde (Bangkok).
“It means Thailand might lose a chance to host the tournament and it would be shifted to other countries,” she told Agence France Presse.
China and South Korea, which lost out to Thailand in previous nominations, could host the event. “The golf tournament will be held in March, and we are still waiting for a clear decision from the government about the ad ban,” said Wimonwan.
Under new regulations endorsed last week, Thai government will ban alcohol advertisements from television, newspapers and billboards from mid-December. The new rules also require warning labels on bottles of alcoholic beverages to alert consumers to potential risks of drinking.
The health ministry estimates that the ban could result in annual losses of 2.5 billion baht (66 million dollars) to the advertising business but say the ban is needed to curb underage drinking.
–The Nation 2006-10-24
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Alcohol-Ad Ban Toned Down
BANGKOK: — The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Thursday radically toned down its “total ban” on alcohol advertising by permitting 24-hour corporate-image TV commercials that carry the name of alcohol companies without showing its brand, logo and alcoholic-beverage products.
The agency said some exceptions were essential to give the alcohol industry more room to manoeuvre.
Apart from the initial exemption for foreign live telecasts and imported newspapers and magazines, the new rules include any form of advertising, both on TV and local print media, that does not carry the alcoholic products, their brand name and logo.
The name of an alcohol company is allowed to appear as a sponsor of a TV programme without time restriction as long as it is not the same name as the alcohol product, said Manit Arunaku, the acting secretarygeneral of the FDA.
If an alcohol company makes other products, such as drinking water, and uses the same logo, advertising for the nonalcohol product is allowed only if the logo comes in a different colour, he said.