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Of tobacco ban, economy
By
Stanley Onjezani Kenani - 19-12-2001 |
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Reading through the article “Africa endorses ban on tobacco at WHO meet,” (The Nation, December 13), a Malawian with a fair knowledge of the country’s economy would not help wondering as to what form of economic death Malawi is going to experience in the near future. One would describe the ban as the death sentence on our economy. In this article it was reported: “African region unanimously agreed to slap heavy taxes on the tobacco industry as one way of discouraging the growing and smoking of tobacco as propagated by the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC)”.
WHO’s anti-smoking campaign has always stated that smoking is responsible for millions of tobacco-related deaths worldwide. This, argues WHO, is enough reason to ban tobacco. The year 2003 has been targeted as the deadline for imposing the ban.
Whereas it is indeed true that tobacco is responsible for causing millions of deaths in the world, I beg to differ on the option of banning it as the ultimate solution to prevent these deaths. I strongly believe there are many other ways WHO can explore to reduce the death rate resulting from tobacco-related diseases.
Already at present, it appears mandatory for tobacco adverts to carry a warning that smoking is hazardous to health. This means all smokers do so with ample knowledge that they risk contraction of tobacco-related diseases. The fact that people go ahead smoking in spite of the warning shows that the smokers’ love for the crop exceeds the love they have for their lives. The smokers know the value of death which, when they weigh against their desire for tobacco, find that it is not enough to make them abandon the habit. What this means is that nothing can dissuade them from smoking, come hail or high waters. These people are guided by an irresistible desire. How sure then is the WHO that banning the growing of tobacco will actually stop people from smoking?
Perhaps it would strengthen the argument if taken by analogy with cannabis sativa and cannabis indica known as chamba in local parlance. In Malawi chamba has remained banned for decades. Anybody caught smoking it, is sent to prison. Growing chamba is illegal. But has this stopped some people from smoking chamba? Certainly no! Even youngsters who were born amid the ban join the fray. There are thousands today in the country who smoke Indian hemp. How the supply is maintained on the market without any stock-outs is still a mystery. But the fact is the ban did not stop people from smoking.
In any case, WHO is not justified in banning tobacco. If in the name of controlling diseases WHO wants to go about banning things, how many will it ban? Alcohol is dangerous and may lead to death. Does this mean it will also be banned to prevent people from dying from alcohol-related diseases? It is also an open secret that prostitution is very instrumental in the spread of HIV/Aids. Millions have died as a result of sleeping with prostitutes. Are we going to ban the prostitution industry? Certainly banning is not the solution.
I hope WHO will give considerable thought to millions of people in the country and other parts of the world who will suffer terribly as a direct consequence of the ban. Already Malawi GDP has been declining since 1995 due to poor tobacco sales. Recently, National Bank of Malawi said an annual GDP growth rate of 6 percent is required if our poverty eradication drive is to be of any meaningful importance (yet our GDP growth rate is well below 3 percent). Already the kwacha is plummeting. Much of the substantial gains we made against the dollar are being eaten away. All this is because tobacco, which accounts for 70 percent of the total export earnings, is now out of season. If the crop is banned, what will happen to our economy?
My suggestion is that if WHO thinks that there is really nothing it can do but to ban tobacco, it should do so in those countries which have ready substitutes for tobacco. The ban would be a death penalty for the economy of the Republic of Malawi. What will become of the 80 percent of the population which directly or indirectly depend on tobacco?
In Malawi today, life has changed greatly due to tobacco. In most of the tobacco growing districts, one finds a lot of people with property worth talking about because of tobacco. Some are able to drive because of tobacco. The auction floors in our cities employ thousands of people. If tobacco goes, all this will cease overnight.
I am of the view that the current inclusion of warning in tobacco adverts remains the best way of reducing the death rate due to tobacco-related diseases. There are also other things that WHO can think of, like targeting youths in primary and secondary schools so that an anti-tobacco culture should be propagated among them. It is nothing more than mere wishful thinking if WHO thinks that banning tobacco will eradicate tobacco-related diseases. It must be something done slowly. A vigorous anti-smoking cmpaign would do the trick say after 10 or 15 years. Little by little we will, like a bird building its nest, achieve what we want. |
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