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• ARGENTINA: Tobacco Treaty Unratified, Six Years On 

Six years after signing the global World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, Argentina is the only Latin American country that has not ratified it, for fear of losing tens of thousands of rural jobs in seven provinces.

The WHO convention, the first global public health treaty, was signed in 2003 by then President Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007). But parliamentary ratification is still pending. . . .

But these provisions, accepted by other tobacco-producing nations, are staunchly opposed in Argentina by the tobacco industry and farmers, and ratification has been blocked in Congress by the representatives of tobacco-producing provinces.

"Until there is a replacement activity for tobacco growers, of which there are around 26,000 small producers around the country, ratification of the convention is unlikely," Senator Sonia Escudero from the northwestern province of Salta, one of Argentina’s main tobacco-growing areas, told IPS.

"Our provinces are among the poorest in the country, and if we lose the 60,000 jobs that tobacco production provides, it would be complete chaos," she said.

But civil society organisations pressing for ratification of the treaty downplay those arguments.

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