Maori and Pacific smoking rates are still too high for us to become a smokefree nation by 2025.

The target is to have less than five percent of smokers in New Zealand in seven years, but the current rate is 16 percent.

Health behaviour change expert Dr Hayden McRobbie told Tim Dower it is higher for Maori, at 35 percent, and Pacific Islanders 25 percent.

He says most smokers know the health and cost risks, but they are battling an addiction.

"The cost is a major motivator for people to quit but because they are addicted to nicotine in tobacco that is a problem."

McRobbie says tobacco needs to be harder to get, and there need to be more safer alternative products available.

"People smoke for the nicotine but they die from the tar, it's the products of combustion the burning of organic material that causes the harm, not so much the nicotine itself."

LISTEN ABOVE AS DR HAYDEN MCROBBIE TALKS TO TIM DOWER