Co-chairwoman of the university's smoke-free campus implementation working group Prof Janet Hoek said its efforts to help smokers quit before the policy change involved training staff to become quit advisers and subsidising nicotine replacement therapy for smokers.
People trained as quit advisers could give out quit cards, which entitled staff and domestic students to up to three rounds of free nicotine replacement therapy per year until May 31, 2015. The university would subsidise the $5 prescription fees, Prof Hoek said.
It was ''difficult to predict'' how much the subsidies would cost the university as that would depend on how many smokers took up the offer.
The university was following the lead of many other tertiary institutions in becoming smoke-free, but offering more support to smokers than other providers had, she said.
''I think what we are doing much better than any other tertiary institution ... is providing support ... to people who decide that this is the time that they would like to give up smoking.''
Given smoking was highly addictive, it was important the university provided support to smokers before the new rule came into force - which was now less than 100 days away.
International evidence suggested introducing smoke-free policies encouraged some smokers to quit, she said.
''As the environment becomes less conducive to smoking, then the number of triggers that will stimulate quit attempts also increase,'' she said.
The university was also running a ''comprehensive publicity programme'' so staff and students could plan for a smoke-free campus.
''This is not telling people that they must quit smoking, or that smoking is no longer tolerated among staff and students. It's saying this is how the campus is going to be, and here are your options for adjusting to this change.''
Fourth-year student and smoker Ben Darroch (22) supported the smoke-free policy, but doubted it would cause many to quit.
It would not be much of an inconvenience to leave the campus grounds to have cigarettes, he said.
International student and smoker Fulin Zhao (23), of China, said the smoke-free policy change might encourage some people to quit smoking.
