On May 1, another government ban on smoking in public places took effect throughout China, but few of the country’s 300 million smokers seem to have noticed, and only a handful of venues are actually enforcing the ban.

One of them is the CJW Jazz Bar at The Place. Although the bar’s website promises that “you will find the CJW cigar club to be the perfect place for your perfect cigar experience,” an employee told us that according to the law, smoking was no longer allowed inside. “But we have some outdoor gardens with some nice chairs where you can smoke,” he added helpfully.

“If I was a government I’d do it the same way,” said Alex Pearson, owner of the Bookworm, which is complying strictly with the smoking ban. “Within eight months, the customers of the Bookworm will be used to the fact that the Bookworm is a non-smoking venue.” She has plans to equip the outdoor smoking area with heaters for winter.

But will cutting out cigarettes hinder business? “Who knows? We might have customers that don’t return because of the smoking thing,” said Stephen Rocard of Mao Mao Chong, one of several Beijing bars like Great Leap Brewery and 12SQM that have been non-smoking from the start. “I think in the end it will be good for business,” said Pearson. “There are more non-smokers than smokers.”

It’s not too difficult to enforce the ban, said Rocard. “Most of our customers are expats, and they come from countries where smoking is banned all over.”

For most Chinese people, however, a smoking ban is a new idea. Even the negative health effects of smoking are poorly understood. A survey last year found that only 23 percent of adults here believe smoking causes strokes, heart attacks and lung cancer. Cigarettes are also the single largest source of tax revenue in China, accounting for nearly US$73 bn in returns in 2010.

Without a strong effort to explain the ban to the public, we wouldn’t be surprised if it goes up in smoke at the first sign of a winter chill.