Trade groups reject WHO guidelines on tobacco: tobacco trade unites Zimbabwe

The International Tobacco Growers' Association reports that leaders of the Asia, Pacific and Caribbean Group of States (ACP) and other major trading groups reject recommendations of the World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Thankfully national political leaders are defending the interests of tobacco growers in their respective countries. Story here.

The threat to tobacco livelihoods is felt so strongly in Zimbabwe that parties who have warred for the last two decades have felt the need for co-operation against the World Health Organisation's attack on the global tobacco trade. Zimbabwe's tobacco accounts for 26 per cent of GDP, and many resent losing such a contribution to the national wealth on the say-so of the World Health Organisation. An account of Zimbabwe's tobacco trade in the context of civil disturbance in the country is here (a couple of the comments are worth looking at).

You can learn more about the ITGA and sign a petition here.