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• Exposed: Tobacco Companies Efforts to Influence Industry Privatisation, The Lancet 

A paper in this week's issue of The Lancet highlights how two tobacco companies attempted to influence plans to privatise the state-owned tobacco industry in Moldova.

Moldova, a small, agriculturally dependent state of 4*3 million people is Europe's poorest country. In October 2000, after pressure from the International Monetary Fund the Moldovan government approved a bill to privatise its tobacco industry.

Anna Gilmore (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK) and colleagues analysed internal tobacco industry documents on Moldova made public through litigation. The documents suggest that although a competitive tender for the state owned monopoly was later announced, British American Tobacco (BAT) and the German manufacturer Reemtsma each initially sought to secure a closed deal. . . .

Dr Gilmore comments: "It is evident from the tactics revealed here that countries undertaking tobacco industry privatisation and the organisations advising them need to ensure a transparent process and a truly competitive tender in order to maximise potential revenue gains. To prevent the predicted increase in consumption likely to arise through the growth of advertising and decline in prices effective tobacco control policies, particularly comprehensive advertising bans and adequate taxation rates, should be implemented before privatisation occurs."

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