The Korea Customs Service has seized W148.3 billion worth of smuggled cigarettes at airports and sea ports across the country since 2020 (US$1=W1,360).
Cases ebbed in the coronavirus pandemic but surged to 295 in the first nine months of this year. Most involved exported Korean cigarettes being smuggled back into the country to take advantage of lower punitive taxes on smoking overseas.
In Korea, cigarette taxes amount to around 70 percent of the retail price, but in Vietnam and Cambodia the tax is less than 30 percent, so a pack of Korean cigarettes costing W4,500 here is sold for just W1,000 in Vietnam.
That price difference is a powerful incentive for many people to load up on Korean cigarettes overseas and attempt to resell them here.
Sixty percent of the cigarettes seized this year were Korean brands. There were also Chinese counterfeits of Korean cigarettes.
One shipping container of smuggled Korean cigarettes is said to fetch a profit of around W700 million.
The operations resemble drug smuggling cartels in that a ringleader based in China or another foreign country hires travelers, resellers or ship owners as mules, while a distributor in Korea handles the sale here.
Roh Shi-kyo at the KCS office in Incheon said, "Smuggled cigarettes are sold in casinos, bars and, but we're going all out to stop it."
