[corp-focus] THE TOBACCO INDUSTRY ACADEMY AWARDS

[robert weissman]

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THE TOBACCO INDUSTRY ACADEMY AWARDS
By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

Everywhere you look, Big Tobacco is proclaiming, "We've changed."

Number two global seller British American Tobacco brags that it has 
risen to 31st on the "2006 Companies that Count" listing, a British 
ranking of supposedly socially responsible companies.

Proclaims BAT's Director of Corporate and Regulatory Affairs Michael 
Prideaux, "If a business is managing products which pose a risk to 
health, we believe it is all the more important that it does so 
responsibly."

R.J. Reynolds, which is now owned in large part by BAT, is a newcomer to 
the social responsibility game, but trying to catch up fast. "At the 
core of our beliefs is the knowledge that we produce a product with 
significant and inherent risks," writes company CEO Susan Ivey in RJR's 
2006 "Corporate Social Responsibility Report." "With that understanding, 
our core values and guiding principles … speak to responsible marketing, 
our approach to tobacco risk reduction and product stewardship."

No company can outdo Philip Morris on this front. "By the end of the 
1990s, our tobacco companies better understood the expectations placed 
upon them," the company asserts on its website.

"Corporate responsibility is a core business objective," contends Andre 
Calantzopoulos, CEO of Philip Morris International. "From youth smoking 
prevention to open discussion of tobacco issues to research into reduced 
risk products, we're reshaping our company to meet society's expectations."

Philip Morris takes the idea of remodeling itself so seriously, it even 
changed its name. No longer is the parent company Philip Morris -- now 
it is Altria.

But to get a glimpse of what Big Tobacco is actually doing (rather than 
saying) around the world, you need to shift attention away from the 
industry's self-aggrandizing propaganda.

The industry's "extreme makeover" was, in equal measure, mocked and 
exposed at the "Tobacco Industry Academy Awards," held in conjunction 
with the triannual World Conference on Tobacco or Health, which finished 
this past weekend in Washington, D.C.

The awards ceremony was a biting parody (you can see video at 
http://www.2006conferences.org/26-media.php#), but unfortunately all of 
the nominations and awards were based on actual industry activities over 
the last three years.

The award recipients:

Best Ploy to Circumvent a Law: Imperial Tobacco. With Australia 
mandating large warning labels on cigarette packs, Imperial innovated 
the idea of "peal off" warnings.

Among the runners up: Philip Morris and BAT. Tobacco advertising is 
prohibited in Senegal -- so Philip Morris has painted entire storefronts 
in its familiar red-and-white. Among BAT's nominations was for its 
conduct in Uzbekistan, where an analysis of internal company documents 
shows the company overturned legislation that banned advertising and 
smoking in public places as part of a deal to buy a formerly state-owned 
company.

Best Effort to Conceal Corporate Ir-Responsibility: BAT, for providing 
free mini-stalls to sell cigarettes to Sri Lankan tsunami victims.

Among the runners up: BAT again, for providing a highly publicized water 
tower to a town in Niger. The problem: It is a waterless water tower, 
with the pumps that were supposed to fill the tower not connected to any 
electrical source.

Best Initiative to Recruit New Smokers: Philip Morris, for a worldwide 
competition that brings young adults from around the world (chosen from 
more than a million applicants) to Marlboro Country -- the U.S. West.

Among the runners up: Philip Morris, for sale in Malaysia of "kiddie 
packs" -- packs of 14 cigarettes that are cheaper than a regular pack. A 
ban on kiddie packs has been delayed at industry urging.

Best Exploitation of a Special Population: Gallaher's Benson & Hedges. 
An uncovered training video for "tobacco girls" -- who approach men 
"young and old" on streets and at bars and offer to light a Benson & 
Hedges cigarette for them -- shows the young women being tutored to 
start the day with a "good wash," followed by careful grooming and 
application of makeup. A "good impression will be transferred to the 
brand and international company you represent," the video instructs.

Among the runners up: Philip Morris, for hawking "Maori Mix" brand 
cigarettes in Israel. (Maoris are the indigenous people of Aotearoa/New 
Zealand.) Confronted at the company's shareholder meeting this past 
April, CEO Louis Camilleri apologized to a Maori anti-smoking activist 
for the misappropriation of the Maori name.

Best Industry Ally: Liu Xiang, an Olympic gold medal-winning hurdler 
from China, is a leading image ambassador for China’s biggest cigarette 
maker, Baisha Group.

Among the runners up: The Bandung Municipal Administration in Indonesia, 
for partnering with Philip Morris on a "school improvement" program, and 
U.S. President George Bush for refusing to send the Framework Convention 
on Tobacco Control to the Senate for ratification. More than 130 
countries have now ratified the tobacco treaty.

That last is the good news. For one thing has really changed about the 
tobacco industry. Around the world, its legitimacy is declining and a 
growing public health movement is imposing meaningful rules to curb 
industry predation.


Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime 
Reporter, <http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com>. Robert Weissman is 
editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor, 
<http://www.multinationalmonitor.org> and director of Essential Action 
<http://www.essentialaction.org>, which helped organize the tobacco 
awards ceremony. Mokhiber and Weissman are co-authors of On the Rampage: 
Corporate Predators and the Destruction of Democracy (Monroe, Maine: 
Common Courage Press).

(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

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