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Press Room

Global Tobacco Control Community Makes Advances on Illicit Trade and Tobacco Industry Liability

Note: World Lung Foundation united with The Union North America. From January 2016, the combined organization is known as “Vital Strategies.”

(New York, USA) – World Lung Foundation today commended national governments for reaching agreement on measures to combat smuggling of tobacco products and to establish legal methods of holding the industry to account for its deceptive business practices. WLF also expressed concern that delegations at the 5th Conference of Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC), failed to establish complete guidelines for improving the taxation of tobacco products, which could have prevented millions of deaths in the coming years.

Advances to Curb Smuggling

Countries agreed to establish a global tracking and tracing system, making it easier to distinguish between legal and illicit products, enhancing cooperation between countries and facilitating investigations. The system will improve control of the legal tobacco trade through improved licensing, diligent record-keeping, and tracing of legal tobacco products. The measure, called the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products (ITP), will come into effect 90 days after its ratification by the Parties to the WHO FCTC.

Holding the Tobacco Industry Accountable

Representatives also agreed to establish an expert group to examine existing best practices in litigation against the tobacco industry, common obstacles to litigation and how they may be overcome. In some countries, successful litigation has resulted in the tobacco industry having to make a contribution towards the financial burden of tobacco use; the wider application of this strategy may help some countries to improve their healthcare capacity or increase their provision of cessation advice and assistance. It could also provide justice and compensation to victims of tobacco harms and their families.

Tobacco Taxation

Delegations from national governments failed, however, to pass guidelines that would streamline increases in tobacco taxes. Only basic guiding principles and recommendations were agreed upon. For example, countries confirmed there should be regular adjustments to tobacco pricing and taxation levels to account for both inflation and income growth. They also agreed to specific tax systems and to a minimum level of taxation that would help reduce consumer demand for tobacco products. Taxation is the single most effective tobacco control intervention and the price and affordability of cigarettes vary widely from country to country – from US $14 per pack in New York City to US .60 cents in Russia.

Peter Baldini, Chief Executive Officer, World Lung Foundation said: “The tobacco epidemic is a global problem and when countries adopt broad international strategies they deliver a concerted, global solution. The agreements in Seoul were a combined breakthrough, with concerted action on illicit trade and potential litigation strategies. The failure to adopt guidelines for implementation of taxation, however, means that more lives will be needlessly lost. The global community must do better if it is to avert the ticking time-bomb of tobacco-related deaths this century.”

Background

The Conference of Parties is a bi-annual event where national governments meet to establish how best to interpret and implement the WHO FCTC, a global treaty that obligates its 176 country signatories to implement policies that reduce tobacco use.

Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of mortality in the world today, and is responsible for more than five million deaths each year—one in ten preventable deaths worldwide. In addition to implementation of the WHO FCTC, WLF also supports the World Health Organization’s M-P-O-W-E-R strategies to reduce tobacco consumption. MPOWER strategies are endorsed and promoted by the Bloomberg Initiative to Reduce Tobacco Use, of which World Lung Foundation is a principal partner.