Tobacco threat to environment

The world marks World No Tobacco Day on May 31 every year to raise awareness of the negative health, social, economic and environmental impacts of tobacco production and use.

This year’s theme— Tobacco: Threat to Our environment—highlighted the environmental impact of the entire tobacco cycle, from cultivation, production and distribution to the toxic waste it generates.

Despite 24 African countries instituting bans on smoking in public places, and 35 banning tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship, the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that one in every 10 African adolescents use tobacco.

The emergence of new products such as electronic nicotine and tobacco products are also proving attractive to the youth, compounding the concerns.

Some 44 of 47 countries in the WHO African Region have ratified the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, committing to adopting effective and evidence-based measures to curb tobacco consumption.

However, the need to address related environmental damage has seen WHO redouble its efforts to counter the overall threat.

The environmental impacts of tobacco farming include massive use of water, which is a scarce resource across most of the continent, along with large-scale deforestation and contamination of our air and water systems.

Land used to grow tobacco could also be used much more efficiently, especially in countries grappling with food insecurity.

To help counter the threat, WHO has joined hands with its sister UN agency, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, and the Kenyan government to create the Tobacco-Free Farms project.

Launched in March, the project supports farms to switch from tobacco to alternative food crops that will help feed communities, rather than harm their health.

The two UN agencies and the Kenyan government provide training, inputs such as seeds and fertiliser, and a ready market for their harvest through the World Food Programme’s local procurement initiatives.

So far, 330 Kenyan farmers have switched to growing beans, with the first harvest yielding more than 200 metric tonnes.

The second season, which has just begun, is now reaching more than another 1000 farmers.

This is extremely encouraging for our plans to roll this programme out to other tobacco-growing countries on the continent.

The hard evidence is essential to change the mindsets of farmers and governments who believe that tobacco is a cash crop with the potential to generate economic growth.

In Malawi, for example, tobacco accounts for about half of all exports. The comparative number among the country’s neighbours is 13 percent in Zimbabwe, six percent in Mozambique and three percent in Tanzania.

What is less accepted is that these are unfortunately short-term gains.

The gains are eclipsed by the long-term consequences of increased food insecurity, sustained debt for farmers, illness and poverty among farmworkers and widespread environmental damage. 

Tobacco-related illness in the African Region accounts for 3.5 percent of annual total health expenditure.

While tobacco leaf production is decreasing globally, it is increasing in the 47-nation region, which now produces about 12 percent of all tobacco leaf internationally.

Nearly 90 percent of tobacco growing in the WHO Africa Region is concentrated in the east and southern Africa sub-regions, including Zimbabwe (26 percent) Zambia (16.4 percent) Tanzania (14.4 percent) Malawi (13.3 percent) and Mozambique (13 percent).

Tobacco growing is a significant driver of deforestation too, due to the large quantities of wood needed for curing.

Deforestation remains one of the largest contributors to carbon dioxide emissions and climate change.

It also advances the loss of biodiversity, land degradation and desertification.

Estimates are that the wood requirement to cure tobacco is responsible for 12 percent of all deforestation in southern Africa.

Additionally, tobacco cultivation exposes farmers to several health risks, including the “green tobacco sickness” caused by nicotine absorbed through the skin during the handling of wet leaves as well as exposure to pesticides and tobacco dust.

Cigarette butts, meanwhile, are by far the single largest category of litter. Science shows cellulose acetate-based cigarette filters are largely non-biodegradable.

Cigarette butts litter pavements, parks and beaches, finding their way into waterways and leaching harmful chemicals that poison animals and aquatic life – and children.

On World No Tobacco Day this year, I call on African governments to impose environmental tax levies on tobacco across the value and supply chains, including production, processing, distribution, sales, consumption and waste management.

For tobacco-growing countries, I fully commit WHO support to assist farmers to switch to alternative crops.

Reducing tobacco consumption is a key catalyst towards realising the health-related Sustainable Development Goals but, as the environmental evidence illustrates, the benefits go far beyond health.