Although Spain banned smoking in workplaces and public buildings more than four months ago, the nation appears to remain as addicted to its old habits as it ever was.

The ban, which came into force on January 1, 2006, has made few inroads into the tobacco culture that still holds Spain in its grip. A price war between tobacco manufacturers and the government has only served to highlight the grasp that the trade has not only on the country but its economy.

In other European countries where tobacco has been prohibited, the bars and restaurants are smoke-free with not an ashtray in sight.  But you will find very few bars in Spain where the non-smoking rule is in force.  This is not because of a general lawlessness but more an adherence to the letter of the loosely-drafted law that has more holes than a filter tip. Bars and restaurants that have a floor area of under a 100 square metres can choose whether to allow customers to smoke. Most have chosen to allow it, placing signs that proclaim Se Permite Fumar (It is permitted to smoke) on the door.  Bars with a bigger floor area must have a specially set-aside smoking area. The overwhelming majority of small bars (and that means most bars in Spain) have elected to remain smoking areas, which has driven a huge road through the government’s pledge to cut the number of smokers in the country. In tourist areas you will frequently find that the foreign owned bars have embraced the no-smoking policy whilst their Spanish counterparts remain intransigent. However, Spain's health minister has threatened that if enough bars and other small establishments don't elect to be smoke free within a year - and the number of smokers nationwide doesn't drop significantly - further restrictions on smoking will follow.

To understand the reluctance of the Spanish to embrace the new law it helps to look at the country’s long relationship with tobacco.  First brought to Spain from Cuba 500 years ago, tobacco has long been as popular as it has been cheap.  Two Spanish explorers, Rodrigo de Jerez and Luis de Torres are claimed to be the first Europeans to try tobacco after seeing native Cubans wrap dried tobacco leaves in palms and light one end. Jerez became a confirmed smoker whilst on his travels but on his return home so scared his neighbours by blowing smoke from his nose and mouth that he was arrested by the Spanish Inquisition and imprisoned for seven years.  Ironically by the time he was released smoking had become a Spanish craze.
Spain’s supremacy in its colony Cuba led in turn to its domination of the tobacco market where commercial competitiveness soon took off. In 1606, in an attempt to keep Spain at the head of tobacco production, King Philip III decreed that tobacco could only be grown in certain Spanish colonies, including Cuba and Venezuela. King Philip also decreed that any tobacco production by foreigners would be punishable by death. Eight years later he decreed that all tobacco produced in the Spanish New World should be shipped to Seville, which then became the world centre for the production of cigars. 
Whilst there is much argument as to the source of the first cigarette, many historians agree that it was probably invented in Spain. It is thought that paupers in Seville were making a form of cigarette, known as a 'papalette', from the butts of discarded cigars and papers as early as the seventeenth century. These crude cigarettes were taken by Spanish and Portuguese sailors on their travels round the world. Although the plantations in Virginia soon became the dominant markets, Spain remained a firmly tobacco orientated country as it still does.

Before the new ban cigarette smoking was pretty much allowed and tolerated everywhere: banks, shops, offices, factories, warehouses, canteens, trains, buses, on TV…there were very few places where you would be frowned upon if you lit up. So the new clampdown has cut to the heart of a nation that takes its freedoms very seriously.  The workplace ban means that you will now see shopkeepers and office staff standing on the street and ironically the barman can’t smoke on the job as it’s his ‘place of work’. This has led to bad feeling from non-smoking colleagues and worries from bosses as to how much time is being wasted standing around enjoying these tobacco breaks.

One of the strangest outcomes of the new law has been the bizarre price war between the government and tobacco manufacturers, which has only just reached an uneasy truce.  As the government raised taxes to hit smokers in the pocket, the manufacturers dropped the costs of a packet of cigarettes to keep their customers on board. Spanish tobacco manufacturer Atladis was forced to cut the price of its brands such as Fortuna when American tobacco giants slashed prices on their own leading products.  The battle to keep smokers happy cost Atladis dear with share prices dropping and cuts in the workforce announced.  It appears, however, to have had little effect on smokers who stocked up on their favourite brands whilst prices were low.  The government has threatened to bring in a minimum price for a packet of cigarettes although the EU has recently warned that such a move would be illegal and a brake on free market forces.

For the smoker in Spain the biggest problem is not so much the price but getting hold of a packet.  The new law means that ordinary shops and newspaper vendors are no longer allowed to sell cigarettes, which has led to a massive drop in their trade and protest marches have followed.  Vending machines have also been removed from all public places and shops, although some still have an under-the-counter supply for their customers, risking a hefty fine if caught, so the only safe place is the ‘Tabac’ shop with its rigid opening hours.

The long-term effects of Spain’s legislation are not easy to judge but as the number of smokers falls in most European countries it appears to remain more or less static in Spain, Spaniards are still the heaviest smokers in the world after the Greeks, Bulgarians and Japanese. According to the most recent National Health Survey, 34% of the adult population in Spain smoke. For every man, woman and child in Spain in 2004, including non-smokers, consumption in Spain was 2,274 cigarettes, substantially higher than annual per capita consumption of 1,446 cigarettes in China, the beacon for international tobacco use.

Alvaro Garrido, a Spanish economist who is also the director of Prohibido Prohibir (Prohibited to Prohibit), a group that has fought the new law says: "For us, we think this law is not an anti-tobacco law, it is an antismoker law and it goes against the Spanish culture. And tobacco is in our culture from a long time."

But all is not lost for the anti-smoking campaigners, the crusade has reached tourists on the Costa Brava, where the town of L'Escala has designated the country's first smoke-free beach. Last week the town hall placed no-smoking signs at the tiny Miranda beach.  If the California-style ban is a success, it will be extended to other beaches, the mayor, Josep María Guinart, told reporters.