By Khetam Malkawi

AMMAN - Fast-food restaurant owners from across the Kingdom said they will implement the Health Ministry’s smoking ban, despite not being informed of its implementation.

The ministry last week said a decision was taken in collaboration with the Jordan Restaurants Association (JRA) to ban smoking in the country’s fast-food outlets, as part of a measure to declare all restaurants smoke-free by the end of this year.

“We have not been informed by any party about the decision, but we are ready to follow any requested procedure to guarantee the implementation of the law,” the owner of Shake-n-Bake restaurant told The Jordan Times yesterday, adding that around 90 per cent of his customers are smokers.

Despite the ban, however, he said restaurant owners will not force customers not to smoke.

“We will hang anti-smoking signs, but if a customer insisted on smoking, we cannot force him or her not to,” he said, preferring to remain unnamed.

“We will be committed to the law if we receive a notification, but we have received nothing so far,” another fast-food restaurant owner, who requested anonymity, told The Jordan Times.

Sami Naffaa, a supervisor in one of the country’s tourist restaurants, said the ban will hurt rated restaurants the most, as a majority of their patrons are smokers.

“Around 70 per cent of our customers are smokers, and I am sure we will struggle to impose the smoking ban,” Naffaa said yesterday.

According to JRA President Zeid Goussous, the decision was implemented in fast-food outlets prior to tourist restaurants because most outlets service patrons who come with their families.

“Applying the measure in tourist restaurants needs to be carefully studied,” Goussous stressed yesterday.

The Public Health Law was amended last year to prohibit smoking in public and private institutions and all public facilities.

The ban includes hospitals, healthcare centres, schools, cinemas, theatres, libraries, museums, public and nongovernmental buildings, public transport vehicles, airports, closed playgrounds, lecture halls and any other location to be determined by the health minister.

Tobacco warnings

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry said on Monday it intends to enlarge the size of pictorial warnings on tobacco packages from 30 per cent of the package size to 50 per cent.

In a statement sent to The Jordan Times yesterday, the ministry said it will not be lenient with those who promote tobacco use in any local media outlet or television.

In a World Health Organisation (WHO) statement marking World No Tobacco Day, WHO Assistant Director-General Ala Alwan said, “Health warnings on tobacco packages are a simple, cheap and effective strategy that can vastly reduce tobacco use and save lives.”

"Warnings that include images of the harm that tobacco causes are particularly effective at communicating risk and motivating behavioural changes, such as quitting or reducing tobacco consumption,” he said.

Approximately 10 per cent of the global population live in countries that require pictorial warnings on tobacco packages, according to WHO.