Seoul City has been monitoring convenience stores and found that illegal cigarette sales to minors have sharply decreased since 2015 from over 48 percent to 14 percent this July.

The ratio of convenience stores not checking the ages of customers when they buy cigarettes also fell from 47-point-six to 14-point-six percent during the same period.

According to the city government, checking a customer’s age through ID verification is the key to reducing illegal tobacco sales. The survey finds that nearly 99 percent of convenience stores did not sell the product to teenagers when the store asked for the customer's age. 

Since the city launched the monitoring program in 2015, chain stores led by their head offices have also implemented voluntary efforts to reduce illegal cigarette sales.

Seoul City is also holding talks with the industry to regulate cigarette advertisements inside retail stores.

The latest monitoring survey for the first half of 2020 was conducted in July on nearly 13-hundred convenience stores in the capital city, employing the use of mystery shoppers.