Tobacco.org

• KRASOVSKY: Does tobacco industry need to be saved? 

Tobacco tax increases are the most effective way to encourage people to stop smoking.

Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko, citing concern for the tobacco industry, on Nov. 11 vetoed legislation that would have hiked the excise tax on tobacco products once more.

It is worth remembering that - even though tobacco excise taxes were increased in September 2008, and again in February and May of this year - cigarette prices in Ukraine remain among the lowest in Europe. This leads directly to a public health catastrophe for the nation and creates conditions for rampant smuggling of made-in-Ukraine cigarettes to other nations. . . .

However, tobacco companies in Ukraine claimed that this tax increase would have been disastrous for their business. . . .

Transnational tobacco companies came to Ukraine in 1993. They promised employment, investment and revenue. Now they control 99 percent of the tobacco production in Ukraine. In 1992, Ukraine produced 9,000 tons of tobacco leaves. However, despite huge increases in cigarette production, tobacco growing has almost disappeared in the country. In 1996-2008, the foreign trade balance of tobacco leaves and products was negative for Ukraine and totaled more than $2 billion. It actually means that Ukrainian smokers invested $2 billion in the economies of other nations.

What tobacco companies actually produce is death. . . .

Many politicians in Ukraine already understand that high tobacco taxes are good both for public health and public revenues. I hope that the current and future president of Ukraine will understand this as well.

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• CORCORAN: Ottawa's fruit-flavoured tobacco bomb 

The result was Bill C-32, officially titled The Cracking Down on Tobacco Marketing Aimed at Youth Act -- a misnomer if ever there was one. Today, a year later, what Mr. Harper's Conservatives have delivered instead is an over-the-top law that threatens a global trade war and another bonanza for Canada's already out-of-control contraband cigarette market.

The trade-war potential gathered momentum earlier this month when, according to Inside US Trade, the United States joined Argentina, Mexico, Switzerland, the European Union and other nations in opposition to Ottawa's new anti-bubble-gum tobacco law. At a meeting in Geneva, the nations said Canada's law would restrict trade in regular tobacco products to the benefit of Canadian tobacco producers.

The more immediate impact of the law, however, is a ban on the sale in Canada of virtually all brands of U.S. cigarettes. Guess where that leads? The logical result of a ban on legal imports of Marlboros and Winstons is new demand for illegal supplies through the burgeoning Native-dominated contraband market, a tax-evading multi-billion-dollar industry that already accounts for between 33% to 50% of the Canadian cigarette market. . . .

While this may look like another case of unintended consequences run amok, it more likely is part of deliberate scheming by Health Canada officials and others who are consciously using fruit-flavoured smokes to create a global tobacco trade bomb against the U.S. and tobacco industries in Europe, South America and Asia. . . .

Still, Bill C-32 became law, even though Senator Segal abstained over the trade issue. As a result, Mr. Harper's opportunistic election gimmick, aimed at curbing the use of flavoured tobacco to children, will do nothing to protect children. By further enhancing the power and scope of the contraband market, it will only increase the supply of illegal cigarettes, a prime source of tobacco to the young. At the same time, the government has launched a protectionist scheme that threatens a trade conflict.

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• Florida Students Rally for Tobacco Workers 

Students at the University of Florida (UF) and the University of Central Florida (UCF) spent last Saturday morning raising their voices for justice for tobacco workers. Chanting�"Justice now!" and holding signs that read "Hasta la Victoria" ("Onward to Victory"), dozens of students marched and rallied on UF's Gainesville campus.

The students joined members of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC), the Student/Farmworker Alliance and the National Farm Worker Ministry to demand justice for tobacco farm workers in North Carolina who suffer low wages and poor working conditions at the hands of Big Tobacco.

The rally followed a UF Student Senate resolution calling for a pay increase and better treatment of Immokalee farm workers, who pick the tomatoes used by Aramark, UF's food provider. "Somebody's got to fight for social justice," said UF junior Justin Wooten.

The students and activists wanted to send a message to Susan Ivey, CEO of Reynolds American, the parent of R.J. Reynolds, the nation's second-largest tobacco company. Ivey has refused to meet with FLOC members

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• Tobacco poison surrounds child workers  

The children pick through mountainous piles of waste tobacco and sweep it up with their bare hands into giant bags in the hope of scraping a living. From behind a veil of dust, they stare back at us with bloodshot eyes.

As the wind gathers in a fading dusk, infant siblings strapped to their mothers' backs wail amid swirling, noxious clouds of tobacco.

Beyond them, a parched maize plantation stretches into the distance towards the factory buildings of Alliance One, the world's largest tobacco processor and the source of up to 30% of the premium tobacco enjoyed by Britain's 13m smokers.

A Sunday Times investigation in the southern African state of Malawi has uncovered an environmental travesty that is being inflicted by the tobacco industry on some of the continent's poorest people.Downstream from the tobacco processing plants that dominate the outskirts of Lilongwe, the Malawian capital, rivers run yellow and green from industrial outflow -- water used for bathing by villagers who have no other option.

Even more alarming, however, is that in a community already plagued by Aids, cholera, malnutrition and one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world, toxic tobacco waste is being dumped by contractors in open landfill sites where hundreds of children are picking through the remnants. . . .

This weekend a spokesman for the American-owned Alliance One said the company would build a wall round the landfill site to keep out children. He said: "We believe that we meet all environmental and other regulatory requirements in Malawi, but we are happy to work further with local authorities to further safeguard children from exposure at the municipal disposal site."

Few benefits from the tobacco industry filter down to Malawi's poor tobacco farmers who eke out a hopeless existence on less than 80p a day.

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• N.C. court rules against tobacco payments 

Maryland tobacco farmers won't receive about $13 million in payments from cigarette manufacturers under a ruling Friday from the North Carolina Supreme Court.

Officials with the Maryland Department of Agriculture said the state had sought to require that Philip Morris, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and Lorillard Tobacco Co. honor an agreement to compensate farmers for the declining sales of tobacco expected from a settlement between the tobacco industry and states over the health care costs of smoking.

"Our farmers have been done a big injustice," said Patrick McMillan, assistant agriculture secretary. "The source of income they were led to believe they were going to get has been taken away from them."

The case stemmed from a disagreement over whether the manufacturers were obligated to continue paying farmers under that agreement after Congress approved in 2004 a $10 billion buyout for tobacco farmers nationally, to be financed by taxing the cigarette industry.

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• Stopping tobacco production not solution to increasing cancer cases 

The government told the National Assembly that it is going to continue supporting tobacco farming despite the increase of cancer cases caused by cigarette smoking since that is not the solution to the problem.

The Deputy Minister for Agriculture, Food Security and Co-operatives, Dr Mathayo David Mathayo said that one of the factors for not stopping the production is that 85% of all tobacco produced in the country is exported, thus only the remaining 15 is consumed in the county.

"Tobacco farming and production employs 1.3 per cent of population, which is equal to 500,000 Tanzanians and their families depending on the crop for their livehoods," explained Dr Mathayo.

However, the deputy minister acknowledged that cigarette smoking has both long term and short term effects, saying that it is the reason for restrictions in cigarette advertising, health warning on the packets and not allowing it to be sold for persons under 18 years.

"I cannot choose between the economic advantages of tobacco production and the health effects that cigarette smokers get, but the precautions and warnings ensure that those using the product know its effects and are all adults, thus have the ability to make decision for themselves," he said.

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• U.S. tobacco growers fighting bill 

The Canadian government is being targeted in a new U.S. advertising campaign that alleges Ottawa's latest anti-smoking law violates international trade agreements by discriminating against U.S. cigarette imports.

In newspaper ads that will run next week in two widely read Capitol Hill newspapers, Kentucky's burley-tobacco growers say they've been side-swiped by legislation that bans candy-flavoured products marketed to youth.

Burley tobacco is air-cured tobacco used primarily for cigarette production. Its growth is centred in Kentucky.

The farmers also are preparing a World Trade Organization complaint that contends provisions in Bill

C-32, which received royal assent Oct. 8, unfairly outlaws the sale in Canada of U.S.-style cigarettes blended with burley.

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• Canada enacts anti-smoking law despite burley growers' concerns  

Canada has given final approval to an anti-smoking law that Kentucky burley growers and lawmakers worry may spell an end to the market for the tobacco leaf north of the border.

The Canadian Senate passed the legislation Tuesday, and it received “royal assent” — final approval — on Thursday.

“This bill is a very important advance for public health in Canada,” said Rob Cunningham, senior policy analyst with the Canadian Cancer Society.

The bill, known as “The Cracking Down on Tobacco Marketing Aimed at Youth Act,” bans flavored tobacco products in Canada.

Burley is one of three kinds of tobacco mixed together with additives for blended tobacco. Some Kentucky lawmakers, led by Rep. Ed Whitfield, R-1st District, have written to American and Canadian officials that the bill’s ban on many of the additives used in blended tobacco effectively outlaws burley.

With 85 percent of U.S. burley exported, the implications of the Canadian action and possible similar actions by other nations are enormous, the Kentuckians warned.

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• Cuba slashes tobacco acreage amid flagging demand 

Cash-short Cuba is slashing the amount of land devoted to growing its famous tobacco by more than 30 percent as the global recession and worldwide spread of smoking bans bite into sales of the country's prized cigars.

Demand for Cuba's cigars fell 3 percent in 2008 and earlier was reported down 15 percent in 2009 because of the recession and the smoking bans adopted in a growing number of places as a public health measure.

Cuba's National Statistics Office, in a report posted on its web page (www.one.cu), said land to be planted with tobacco for next year's crop had dropped to 49,000 acres, down from 70,000 acres, which was in turn less than 2008.

It said the coming crop was expected to be 22,500 tons, down from a planned 26,800 tons.

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• Canadian bill worries Kentucky tobacco growers 

An hour and a half after hearing testimony, a Canadian Senate panel in Ottawa last week approved an anti-smoking bill that Kentucky burley tobacco growers fear may be bad for their business.

The bill, known as "The Cracking Down on Tobacco Marketing Aimed at Youth Act," passed the Senate Social Affairs, Science and Technology Committee on a voice vote and without amendments. It now awaits final action in the Canadian Senate.

The measure is intended to ban flavored tobacco products in Canada, but burley growers are worried that the bill will end the export of American burley to Canada.

Burley is one of three kinds of tobacco mixed together with additives for blended tobacco. Some Kentucky lawmakers, led by Rep. Ed Whitfield, R-1st District, have written to American and Canadian officials that because the pending bill in the Canadian Parliament prohibits many of the additives used in blended tobacco, the measure effectively bans burley.

With 85 percent of U.S. burley exported, the implications of the Canadian action and possible similar actions by other nations are enormous, the Kentuckians warned.

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• Amid industry uncertainties some tobacco farms grow  

RICHMOND -- Farming, David Ferrell says, "is all I ever wanted to do."

At age 20, the recent Virginia Tech grad sees a good future in farming, even for tobacco, a crop that has sustained his family's farm in Charlotte County for several generations.

Despite the many uncertainties in tobacco, including declining U.S. smoking rates, rising tobacco taxes and regulation of the industry by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Ferrell and his brother, Kevin, 24, are investing in tobacco production. They are following in the footsteps of their father, Timmy, 50, who is still active in the operation.

"When I finished school and made my decision about coming back to the farm, I thought about whether there was a future in tobacco, and I think there is," David Ferrell said. "Tobacco will always be grown. How much I don't know, but I do feel it has a future."

He describes the farm as "a true agribusiness" now. Unlike the smaller tobacco farms of 10 or 20 acres limited by federal quotas attached to the land, theirs is an unregulated operation increasingly using mechanization, and producing 150 acres of leaf for tobacco companies on a contract basis.

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• Child tobacco farmers 'exposed to toxic levels of nicotine' 

* Children can absorb up to 50 cigarettes worth of nicotine on wet days

* Wearing gloves, washing clothes or bathing would all reduce exposure and risk

* Green Tobacco Sickness 'feels like death,' induces headaches, nausea

* Report reveals widespread abuse of child workers, withheld wages, violence . . .

Hundreds of thousands of children worldwide are thought to be working full-time on tobacco farms, suffering from toxic levels of nicotine exposure and abusive labor conditions.

Children as young as five-years-old work on tobacco farms in Malawi, according to Plan International.

In Malawi alone there are an estimated 78,000 boys and girls employed in tobacco harvesting. On average they earn 17 cents for a 12-hour day of back-breaking, bare-handed work, according to a recent report from Plan International.

Handling burley tobacco leaves without gloves, in unwashed clothes and rarely bathing, these children can absorb the same amount of nicotine in one day of harvesting that they would from smoking 50 cigarettes. . . .

Today UNICEF, the ILO, Plan and others all remain active in Malawi, working with the government to develop links between the ministries of labor and agriculture to end child labor on tobacco farms.

Since the report came out in August, Plan International told CNN in an email that "the government has been constructive in their response and are discussing/looking to work with Plan to conduct a national survey to gauge the true scale of the issue and better enforcement of existing child labor laws."

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• Malawi Deports Universal, Alliance Tobacco Officials (Update3)  

Malawi, the world’s largest burley tobacco producer, said it will deport officials of Alliance One Inc. and the local unit of Universal Corp. for paying below government-mandated prices for the leaf.

“This is the action I have taken,” President Bingu wa Mutharika said in a speech broadcast live on the state-owned Malawi Broadcasting Corp. radio station today. “They have been defying my orders to pay better prices and I have decided to chase them.”

The government yesterday revoked temporary work permits for officials of Alliance One, Universal-unit Limbe Leaf Tobacco, and Premium Tama Tobacco Co., and issued them with 24-hour deportation orders. . . .

Malawi started setting minimum prices for the various grades of tobacco two years ago after it accused merchants of putting farmers out of business. While dealers denied that they underpaid farmers, Wa Mutharika on April 6 threatened to deport buyers if prices didn’t improve.

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• Illegal tobacco trade hurting producers: MPP 

Canadian politicians and tobacco producers are clamouring for action on the illegal tobacco trade after a U. S. grand jury in the state of Washington indicted two founding partners of a Six Nations cigarette maker accused of taking part in a conspiracy to supply contraband cigarettes.

Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett said in weekend interview that he couldn't speak to the specifics of the case, but he was quick to say enforcement eff orts north of the border have been woefully insufficient in countering cross-border contraband activities.

"In Canada and, particularly, Ontario, we are not seeing adequate enforcement with respect to the illegal trade of tobacco products, and both the federal and provincial governments need to do more," Barrett said.

"This trade eliminated most of our Ontario tobacco growers who cannot compete while producing a legitimate product. We've seen the blatant establishment of smoke shacks, particularly on Highway 6 and Highway 54, and not enough is being done to stop it."

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• Lawsuit moves ahead  

Individuals and businesses that have suffered financially and emotionally due to government policies on tobacco gathered last week to learn more about a lawsuit filed against the federal and provincial governments.

In late June, the New Tobacco Alliance Committee (NTAC) filed a claim of $500-million against both levels of government for their part in the decline of the tobacco industry.

The meeting held at the Delhi Belgian Club saw a turnout of more than 200 tobacco growers and NTAC members and others interested in the suit. Lawyers were also on hand to answer questions.

NTAC they opened the doors one last night to anyone interested in joining the suit.

If the matter does proceed to trial, NTAC is seeking to have the claim certified as a class action suit.

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