[Intl-tobacco] Tobacco Industry Pushes to Influence FCTC Negotiations

[Robert Weissman]

Tobacco Lights Into WHO
Industry Pushes to Influence October Treaty Debate Over Global Curbs on
Cigarettes
By Sam Loewenberg
Legal Times
Monday, September 11, 2000
http://www5.law.com/dc-shl/display.cfm?id=3787

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The world's largest cigarette makers have embarked on a global lobbying
campaign to undermine a proposed international treaty that could place
tight restrictions on cigarette advertising and smuggling.

Negotiations over the treaty, which is being organized by the World Health
Organization, are set to begin next month in Geneva and are expected to
take at least two years. Like most treaties, it is crafted through a
consensus process, and individual countries ultimately decide whether they
want to sign or not.

Cigarette makers are largely excluded from the talks, so the three major
multinational tobacco companies - the Philip Morris Cos., British American
Tobacco P.L.C. (BAT), and Japan Tobacco - have taken their case against
the treaty directly to most of the 192 countries involved in drafting the
document.

"We are trying to make sure that the governments locally understand the
full scope of what the WHO is trying to sell to them to make sure that
they understand that this has the potential of far-reaching consequences,"
says Axel Gietz of Japan Tobacco, which last year purchased all of the
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.'s international operations.

"We are not asking WHO for voting status," says Philip Morris Vice
President for Corporate Affairs Don Harris. "We are asking for
participation in the thing and to [have them] consider our views."

>From country to country, the cigarette companies are making the case that
the treaty should be considered an economic, not just a public health,
issue. The companies are coordinating their activities in nations where
more than one company is present.

BAT and Japan Tobacco say they are explicitly lobbying to kill the treaty.
Philip Morris says it is not necessarily against an international tobacco
pact, but prefers regulation on a country-by-country basis.

The companies tailor their pitch in approaching individual governments. In
China, for example, the companies warn of massive tax losses if the treaty
succeeds in cutting down the rate of smoking. In Malawi, where tobacco is
the country's main agricultural export, they make dire predictions about
the collapse of the local agricultural economy if the pact is adopted. In
Lebanon, they predict hundreds of millions in advertising losses.

Harris of Philip Morris says that all of his lobbying on the treaty is
being done in the most open way possible. "We are not going to dispute the
process or be adversarial or confrontational," he says.

But public health officials expressed skepticism in the wake of an August
report from the WHO that brought to light how multinational tobacco
companies had for decades secretly infiltrated the institution through the
use of front groups to systematically undermine anti-smoking efforts.

"For them to say that they have been excluded from this debate is
disingenuous in the extreme when you look at the activities they have
undertaken to infiltrate and suborn the processes of WHO," says Judy
Wilkenfeld of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. Wilkenfeld is the former
director of the tobacco advertising section of the Federal Trade
Commission.

Doug Bettcher, treaty coordinator for the WHO, says the industry has been
presenting misleading information to countries about the organization for
years. He declines further comment, other than to say he is "quite
confident that the negotiations will continue."

The industry has already scored a major victory in China that could well
affect the outcome of the Geneva talks. While each country gets only one
vote in the negotiations, larger countries have significantly more
bargaining power. China, with one-third of the world's smokers, will be
among the most powerful players.

The way in which the tobacco companies were able to influence the Chinese
government illustrates the often indirect nature of the lobbying effort in
each country.

BAT officials convinced the Chinese-owned tobacco company, with which it
has a joint venture, that the WHO treaty could present a severe economic
threat, given that cigarette taxes account for 10 percent of all tax
revenue. In order to protect its interests, BAT pressed state tobacco
company representatives to get themselves included in the Chinese
delegation, which originally was to include only health officials. BAT
even brought in three experts from London to lecture the Chinese on the
possible economic effects of the treaty.

"BAT persuaded the monopoly to look at it from a national economic
perspective," said BAT public affairs director Brenda Chow last May, as
she took a break from the briefing her company was giving to Chinese
tobacco officials in Beijing. "We are the bridge."

The Chinese tobacco company took BAT's advice, lobbied government
officials in charge of selecting delegates, and were added to the
negotiating team.

Judith Mackay, a Hong Kong-based tobacco control expert who advises the
WHO and the Chinese government, fears that the addition of the state
tobacco company to the delegation could seriously skew the negotiation
process because the state tobacco industry's economic power gives it far
more sway than the health ministry has with top Chinese decision-makers.

Proxies, Pressure, Threats

In many cases, it appears that the tobacco companies have attempted to
exert their influence through proxies.

In Malawi, BAT was successful in getting tobacco growers appointed to the
country's WHO delegation, says John Kapito, himself a delegate and the
head of a nongovernmental public health group.

Nonetheless, Kapito thinks that the Malawian government will favor a
strong treaty, as youth smoking is on the rise. BAT currently advertises
its brands - called Life and Embassy - near schools, hospitals, and
churches, says Kapito.

In Lebanon, Philip Morris operated behind the scenes to fight the health
ministry's anti-smoking program, says Yousef Bassim, who runs a tobacco
control program in that country. "They are trying to put pressure on our
activities. But not directly," he says.

Bassim says that he was present when the head of a local advertising
agency that does work for Philip Morris threatened a television
interviewer that he would lose his job if he asked the health minister
about tobacco issues. Bassim also cites recent advertising industry
warnings that banning tobacco advertising could cost the country $500
million in lost revenue.

In Indonesia, BAT and Philip Morris approached a local nongovernmental
organization, the National Committee on Smoking Control, to ask for the
group's support in getting tobacco representatives on the WHO delegation.
The companies made their request in the midst of an offer to aid with
youth smoking programs, says Mia Hanafiah, an official with the
anti-smoking group. Her group turned the companies down, she says. As of
today, the tobacco companies are not on the delegation.

In Japan, little lobbying is necessary, as Japan Tobacco is owned by the
Ministry of Finance. Japan Tobacco purchased the international operations
of R.J. Reynolds last year and is now actively lobbying in all of the
countries where it has significant operations, says spokesman Axel Gietz.
He says the company has already successfully made its case against the WHO
treaty in Russia, Romania, and Turkey, although he declined to elaborate.

In Germany, it's still unclear what position the government will take on
the WHO treaty. But the tobacco industry's "influence is immense," says
Dr. Martina Poetschke-Langer, the head of the Cancer Prevention Unit of
the National Cancer Research Center. She cites internal company documents
that surfaced in the course of U.S. litigation that reveal that the
industry has contacts at the highest levels of the German government.

"They are lobbying day and night the members of our parliament," says
Poetschke-Langer.

The industry's work appears to have paid off in a related matter. The
German government is fighting in court the 1998 ban on cigarette
advertising passed by the European Parliament.

For its part, the negotiating team from the United States will include
representatives from an interagency task force that include the
departments of Agriculture, Treasury, and Commerce. The White House has
consulted, and will continue to consult with, tobacco companies, growers,
and public health groups, according to an administration spokeswoman who
spoke on condition of anonymity.

While WHO officials had expected the cigarette makers to take some action
in response to the treaty, says Mackay, the Hong Kong-based tobacco
expert, it was not clear how much the companies would impact the process.

"It worries me," she says, "that they may be more successful than some
people had bargained for."


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Sam Loewenberg is a reporter at Legal Times. His e-mail address is
sloewenberg@legaltimes.com.