The plight of tobacco growers: ASH Scotland misses point of reader's letter

On Wednesday the Herald published a letter drawing attention to the importance of tobacco growing in parts of the world. It reminded readers that while it is worthy to have health goals, the degree to which certain economies depend on tobacco makes the prospect of a non-smoking future troublesome. (In fact, no one wants to be entirely dependent on a single product, and as we hear below it is unlikely that the tobacco industry is likely to shrink any time soon.) The author of this letter, Alex Flett, clearly criticises the anti-smoking agenda of ASH and other bodies in this light:

Are organisations such as Action on Smoking Health, local authorities, the Scottish Government and others going to replace lost dollar income to those countries that desperately need it and help them find other ways to earn hard currency?

Essentially he is asking whether a drive to eradicate smoking is really ethical.

You would think the reply by Sheila Duffy, published the following day, related to a completely different letter. She does not even address the question, 'How ethical is ethical?' in relation to her anti-smoking policies, indeed she opens her own letter, 'Alex Flett is right to raise concerns over the impact of growing tobacco in developing countries'. But this is not what he does.

Sheila Duffy does it however, but not in the most convincing terms:

The tobacco industry argues that it brings economic benefits to tobacco-growing countries. In fact the majority of profits go to the companies, while, as the World Health Organisation points out, tobacco farmers often become trapped in a cycle of poverty and debt. Farmers are forced by tobacco companies to enter into contracts to buy seeds, fertilizer and technical advice and sell their product at a set fee lower than the cost of production.

     

The tobacco crop's labour-intensive nature means it requires large amounts of pesticides and fertilizers, which farmers must buy in advance at great cost. Should crops fail the farmers themselves are liable to cover these costs. This doesn't even take into account the level of damage these chemicals cause when they end up in the soil, waterways, and the food chain. Child labour is also common, with poor families dependent on their children working on tobacco farms from an early age.

This is highly selective activity on the part of the WHO, and highly selective reporting by Sheila Duffy. When I googled 'farmers forced to buy seed at high prices', I got a page of entries about Monsanto and genetically modified agriculture. No doubt this does occur in some tobacco plantations, but pretending that it is unique to the tobacco companies, or that farmers will be safe from it by embarking on some other crop, is extremely irresponsible. (In fact when the antis were talking some time ago about how tobacco companies exploited children, I went to the website of
the International Labour Organization. Not only was there no mention of tobacco but the video on the first page shows a tobacco plantation that is shown as a model enterprise because of the education it offers children whose parents work there.)

Ms Duffy concludes her letter, still without making any reference to the issues raised by Mr Flett. She does however point out beans and maize are less labour-intensive than tobacco – a point no context as she clearly has little knowledge of agriculture.

This brief interview puts some issues in context: President of the International Tobacco Growers Association is interviewed by the BBC. He puts the points:

1. that the world tobacco market is growing;
2. that the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control has created an uneven playing field since only the signatory countries are bound by it. In the case of tobacco, many major players in the tobacco industry, such as the US, will benefit from any tightening of FCTC provisions, since these big players are not bound by them.
3. that the World Health Organisation continually freezes tobacco farmers out of opportunities to consult about converting from tobacco to alternative crops.

Does the World Health Organization want to kill tobacco growing in Africa?

Antonio Abrunhosa thinks so. He is the CEO of this organisation (International Tobacco Growers' Association) and you can see him in action here:



The Lagos writer of this piece, Torin Orugun, takes issue with the idea that WHO is out to destroy the tobacco industry. He cannot find any direct evidence that tobacco control expects tobacco not to be grown in Africa.

The motions on these topics are lengthy and involved and I haven't looked through them either to find evidence that WHO wants to kill off the tobacco industry in Africa. However the writer has accepted the view that tobacco kills, and that Articles 17 and 18, which concern the development of alternatives to tobacco growing, take into account the impossibility of  rushing this process. He quotes a local Framework Convention Alliance member who accuses the ITGA of being a tobacco front group (the ITGA, representing  several million farmers across the globe, has three staff including its chief executive. If it is funded by the tobacco industry it is not funded well), which wants to undermine the credibility of the World Health Organisation's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, using the farmers as a vehicle.

The case of the ITGA is that the people working on developing alternatives to tobacco in developing countries do not know about tobacco, and far from wanting to understand the experience of tobacco farmers, they actually exclude them from their discussions. Even government representatives from departments other than health are not really welcome. The delegations then hear criticisms of the contributions of the tobacco industry, including its participation in debt bondage and child labour (see link to Articles 17 and 18 above). This is disingenuous as it is a feature of poverty and characterises other industries as well. This website on child labour mentions tobacco only as one of many forms of child labour: there is no guarantee any form of agriculture replacing tobacco would be able to eradicate it. See also video at the foot of this piece.

Orogun mentions the mechanism by which all parties to the Convention must work by consensus before motions are adopted, denies that there is any plan to ditch tobacco farming and quotes people who criticise ITGA for their lack of positive comment on the positive health impact of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. He seems to conclude that representation within the World Health Organisation is fair and effective, and that it is beyond reproach on the basis of its stated aims.

Much as I agree that it is not healthy for a single industry to control agriculture in any country, as tobacco is held to do in Malawi, it is also bad that an international body that is accountable only to its members (delegates who have limited personal experience in tobacco cultivation) should control policy in member countries of the FCTC in a way that denies participatory rights to those involved in the tobacco industry. If tobacco is too dominant, this is not a problem that should be resolved by people outside the country with a clear agenda to reduce tobacco consumption. The conflict of interest is overwhelming. The balance of a country's economic and social needs should be tackled from within.


5 minutes 30 seconds in, report of an Argentinian tobacco project that has led the way locally in eliminating child labour. Source

Showing that tobacco growers are also critical of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control

h/tip the Foresteirann blog for this small story. Tobacco growers, through their association the International Tobacco Growers' Association, issued a statement at the end of the ITGA's African regional meeting at the end of May. The declaration expresses opposition for the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, pointing out that it was not meant to eradicate tobacco farming but its implementation has been characterised by a failure to consult adequately with growers.

You can watch the CEO of the ITGA, Antonio Abrunhosa, in televised debate here.

Kenya split on tobacco growing

Growing pressure on the tobacco industry has encouraged the Kenya Tobacco Control Alliance to call on Kenyan tobacco farmers to abandon their crop – a call resisted by tobacco farmers who have seen no viable alternatives opening to them.

The Tobacco Control Alliance has no doubt that its anti-tobacco policies are sound policy. Following the lead of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, they have instituted bans on smoking in public places. The tobacco farmers don't like it because tobacco is a staple crop. But because they have also recently fought the tobacco companies over working conditions, the Tobacco Control Alliance can't understand the farmers' support for the tobacco trade.

The health toll on tobacco workers, according to the tobacco control alliance, is indeed heavy: It is no longer news that women and children from tobacco growing areas continue to suffer from Green Tobacco Sickness (GTS), damaged lungs, amputated legs and other diseases caused by growing and home processing of tobacco ... Not even the wild animals move closer to the leafy crop.

... And so on. The article continues to report the environmental devastation wrought by tobacco: 'Chiefs in this area decry of the fast declining soil fertility and the environmental degradation caused by tobacco curing. They complain of persistent drought, lack of water, famine and death of animals which share the same water source for watering tobacco.'

Nowhere is it reported that any alternatives have presented themselves for tobacco farmers, however. Their problem of being tobacco farmers might be linked to their poverty, but being without a trade won't make them any better off. The agenda of the KTCA is fighting tobacco in collaboration with their colleagues elsewhere in the world. They are not fighting for the interests of the farmers, and can't even understand why the farmers wish to defend an industry that grinds them into the ground.  Because of the KTCA's heavy anti-tobacco agenda it is even hard to ascertain whether tobacco farming is always as exploitative and environmentally destructive as they describe. They certainly don't have the detachment required to assist the farmers to change  to another crop, or even to advise whether this is their best option.

The first story tells us that British American Tobacco are also defending the tobacco trade in Kenya, describing anti-tobacco measures as attempts to restrict trade rather than to promote health. It's hard not to agree, knowing the agenda of the FCTC. A village elder stresses the dangers of transferring to the uncertainties of an alternative crop. Health problems from tobacco farming appear to be tangible, but so far the alternatives aren't presenting themselves (as Mr Abrunhosa of the International Tobacco Growers' Association complained in this video).

It would seem as usual that the rural poor in Kenya are pawns in the games played by larger players. In the meantime I am quite glad that they can express opposition to the tobacco manufacturers on one side and the Kenya Tobacco Control Association on the other.