ABS responds to 'Estimate Household expenditure on tobacco'

The ABS estimates household expenditure on tobacco on a quarterly basis. To do this, the ABS uses aggregate sales data from relevant suppliers and deflates their values using a single price index for the cigarette and tobacco expenditure category.

The number of cigarettes per packet is not picked up in the aggregate sales data. The price index used to deflate the aggregate sales data accounts for changes in quantities, including the number of cigarettes per packet. This results in a chain volume measure where the price impacts have been removed to obtain the underlying consumption expenditure of Australian households.

The chain volume measure (seasonally adjusted) of household consumption for cigarettes and tobacco has declined 39% from March 2001 to March 2014.

The ABS does not measure or estimate the number of cigarettes consumed.