TOBACCO AND POVERTY: A VICIOUS CIRCLE

The Summary
The negative effects of the use of tobacco on the life of the people are well
known. But the strong relationship of tobacco use with poverty might never be
taken in account. Tobacco contributes to the poverty through loss of income and
skills as well as disease and death. It is in fact the poor and the poorest who tend
to smoke the most. Another study concludes that smoking prevalence in men
tend to be higher in lower and middle income economies. At country level,
Tobacco consumption varies with the socio economic group. There are several
ways in which tobacco increases the poverty at individual, household and
national levels. At the individual and household levels the money spent on
tobacco can have a very high opportunity cost. The poor spent on tobacco, a
part of their basic necessities such as food, shelter, education and health.
Tobacco also contributes to the poverty of individuals as they are at a much
higher risk of falling ill and dying pre-maturely of cancers, heart attacks and other
tobacco related diseases. Thus depriving their families of much needed income
and imposing individual additional healthcare cost. Those who cultivate tobacco
are also exposing themselves to great health hazards. At national level, countries
suffer huge economic losses as a result of high health care costs as well as low
productivity due to tobacco related illness and pre-mature deaths.
The important fact is that increased use of tobacco is among the poor. The
poorest households in Bangladesh spent almost 10 times as much on tobacco as
on education. In fact, the poor are surrounded in so much problems that they try
to seek refuge in excessive use of tobacco to release their tensions. Thus we can
conclude that one of the important reasons for the poor to remain poor is the
excessive use of tobacco.
Some people think that the tobacco industry is also contributing a lot in
eliminating poverty but the facts and figures reveal that the employment in the
tobacco industry is negligible. The executives and the high level officials are
obviously benefited a lot in this business but almost no incentive is given to the
poor or low level employees. Over the past few decades, the production of the
tobacco increased dramatically particularly in developing and under developed
countries. The profit goes in the pockets of the foreign investors from the
multinational companies and the most of the losses are to be borne by the poor
countries. Another survey concludes that the combine revenue of the three
largest tobacco processing companies is greater than the GDP of 25 countries.
Current projection show that the no. of smokers worldwide will increase from the
current 1.3 Billion to more than 1.7 Billion in year 2025. The developed agencies,
donors and health organizations are considering the use of tobacco is more than
only a health issue. Thus there is an immediate need to control the excessive
use of tobacco to reduce poverty as well as health hazards. The opportunity cost
lost can be regained and utilized effectively to get rid of poverty. The most
important thing is to educate the poor about the evil effects of the use of tobacco
and the benefits that they can get by giving off the use of tobacco. The
commission on macro-economics and health, the European commission are
taking appreciable steps to reduce the use of tobacco.
In May 2003, all 192 member states of the WHO took a historic step by adopting
unanimously “The WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control”. In doing
so, they were showing their commitments to protect the citizens from the
damaging effects of tobacco. Measures called for in the Convention would help in
reducing the tobacco consumption. It represents the turning point in addressing a
major global killer and signals a new era in international tobacco control.