Tobacco farmers from China, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, Korea, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia will gather on March 28-30 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to protest against a recommendation by the World Health Organization (WHO) to phase out tobacco growing without providing solutions to those who will lose their jobs.

They said under the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), governments that signed the treaty 10 years ago committed to help tobacco farmers find viable alternatives to growing tobacco, with the assumption that demand would decline over time.
Today, they said, WHO gave in to years of pressure from anti-tobacco nongovernmental organizations and issued recommendations which have taken a radically different direction—phase out tobacco growing without finding viable solutions to their livelihoods.
“For years now, blinkered health bureaucrats with no experience in agriculture have been working behind the safety net of the WHO to explain how tobacco farmers can support their families with alternative crops. Yet, with absolutely nothing to show, they’ve decided the simple solution is to tell governments to make it impossible for growers to keep growing tobacco, regardless of the outcome on millions of jobs,” said Antonio Abrunhosa, CEO of the International Tobacco Growers Association, which represents more than 30 million tobacco farmers around the world.
Asia is home to millions of tobacco farmers and produces more than half of the world’s production of tobacco leaf. For many, tobacco is the only crop they can grow which provides sustainable income for their families. (pi)