International negotiations on tobacco policy and smuggling have yielded little in the past two weeks. Decisions on stricter tobacco product guidelines have been pushed back to the next meeting in two years’ time.
Due to the corona crisis, the participating countries had to negotiate online. This was difficult due to the large time differences, says the World Health Organization WHO, the UN institution that organized the conference.
“That is of course a great pity,” says outgoing State Secretary Paul Blokhuis (Public Health, ChristenUnie) to The Investigative Desk, which followed the negotiations for NRC. The Netherlands would have been the host country for the conference last year, but it was canceled due to corona. Blokhuis wanted the Netherlands to play a role in driving stricter agreements. Now Geneva provided a stage, the seat of the WHO – a year later, and only virtually.
No fewer than 181 countries took part in the meeting, the ninth since the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), the WHO anti-tobacco treaty from 2005. “A lot has been achieved in that time”, according to Belgian prevention expert Luk Joossens, participant in the negotiations. . He refers, among other things, to agreements on advertising, smoke-free areas and higher excise duties.
But stricter rules for ‘new tobacco products’, at the center of the most recent conference, were out of the question this time. Consensus is required for every decision – and that is not the case with e-cigarettes, says Joossens. Some countries forbid them, others see them as a solution to combat smoking. “It is then impossible to make agreements.” In the WHO context, the theme will now be discussed again in 2023 at the earliest.
support fund
The tobacco multinationals prefer to avoid stricter rules for electronic cigarettes for as long as possible. Blokhuis: “This postponement gives the industry more time to expand the market for new products, while regulation is lagging behind.”
What a decision was made about, however, was the creation of a fund that could offer poorer countries – growth markets for cigarettes – financial support in their fight against tobacco. However, concrete, serious commitments from rich countries, including the Netherlands, were not forthcoming. The WHO wants to collect 50 million euros next year in an investment fund, from which developing countries can use the expected proceeds – 2 million euros – to combat smoking and tobacco smuggling. On the basis of plans from previous conferences, 24 billion euros are needed.
Still, Blokhuis sees the fund as ‘an important milestone’. Joossens is also happy. He is concerned, however, that poor countries are dependent on rich countries for their own tobacco policy. “Precisely because most tobacco deaths occur in developing countries.” According to the WHO, about 8 million people die every year from smoking. This makes it the leading preventable cause of death in the world.
Lobby
The World Health Organization’s Tobacco Convention explicitly excludes the industry from negotiations. That does not stop the multinationals from lobbying through other participants. For example, countries such as Guatemala and Nicaragua, which have close ties to the tobacco industry, have delayed talks in Geneva, said Anca Toma, director of the international anti-tobacco umbrella organization SmokeFree Partnership. “We lost a day of the conference because of that alone. The virtual made it difficult to do anything about it.”
The Philippines called for all – “and we mean all” – stakeholders to be involved in the negotiations. By this, the country was referring to the banned tobacco industry and affiliated lobby groups that present themselves as consumer organizations.
Those ‘consumer organizations’ received the statement with cheers. At the start of the conference, NRC published research by The Investigative Desk in collaboration with Le Monde, which showed that the industry is funding some of these clubs in order to exert influence. The self-proclaimed ‘citizens’ movement’ World Vapers’ Alliance (WVA) is basically a libertarian lobby group funded by the tobacco industry. With their professional lobby, these types of organizations overshadow genuine consumer initiatives without capital and support from the tobacco industry.
Also read the research story: Disguised as a citizen’s movement, the tobacco industry lobbies against strict e-cigarette legislation
Before the negotiations began, the WHO had explicitly warned against “industry front groups” and advised governments to keep them out. The WVA demonstrated in front of the closed doors of the WHO in Geneva. This group sent an unknown number of participants a gift package with balloon and bow, which contained a fortune cookie with a positive message about e-cigarettes. That recommendation was not given to the Netherlands. Blokhuis: “In my policy, such products are not part of the solution, but part of the problem.”
Damage control
According to the industry and lobby groups, e-cigarettes can limit the damage caused by smoking. The World Health Organization questions this: their use releases fewer harmful substances, but e-cigarettes are still carcinogenic and addictive.
The tobacco industry faced another setback. Manufacturers of tobacco that are heated rather than burned – such as Philip Morris with its IQOS – claim these new products are ‘smoke-free’. The WHO has now drawn a line based on scientific evidence: the released substances from these products fall ‘clearly within the scientific definition of tobacco smoke’.
After Geneva, the eyes are on Brussels. The European Commission is working on stricter measures for (electronic) cigarettes, which can serve as an example for the rest of the world. This week, the World Vapers’ Alliance traveled from Switzerland to the European Parliament in Brussels to bring gifts to sympathetic MEPs.
The Investigative Desk is a collective of investigative journalists that finances its work through donations, grants, co-funding and fees. Funders have no say in the investigations.
A version of this article also appeared in NRC in the morning of November 22, 2021
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