[Intl-tobacco] Africa: Tobacco Groups Target Women

[Robert Weissman]

Tobacco Groups Target Women

by Khadija Magardie / Mail and Guardian (Johannesburg)

;
Source: All-Africa.com, Friday, 10/20/00
Johannesburg

Health activists are concerned about a vigorous advertising campaign to
recruit
more women smokers, particularly in developing countries.

Latest statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO) indicate
there are
about a billion smokers worldwide - less than 12% of which are women.

But, women's health activists say, this figure is expected to mushroom
rapidly
in the next 10 years, due to what they call a deliberate, vigorous
campaign by
tobacco advertisers to "recruit" women smokers.

What is more worrying, they say, is that the adverts appear more
inclined
towards women in previously untapped markets - in developing countries.

At public hearings held by the WHO last week, the growing number of
women who
smoke and are addicted to nicotine was one of the issues highlighted.
The South
African-based Health-e News Service reported that delegates appealed to
the WHO
to "support measures to protect women from the persuasive images used in

cigarette advertising".

South Africa, particularly, has seen a proliferation of tobacco adverts
featuring women - which appear to be following a carefully planned
strategy.
Nearly all the billboards and glossy magazine adverts (tobacco may not
be
advertised on television) associate a smoking woman with youth,
sophistication,
femininity, glamour and, most significantly, independence.

The Johannesburg-based Women's Health Project (WHP) has done extensive
research
on tobacco advertising campaigns and women in developing countries,
particularly in Africa, and recently published an academic paper
entitled: How
to make tobacco control policies more gender sensitive.

Using data collected in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Sweden and
China, the
WHP found that tobacco advertisers constantly promote the idea that
smoking
equals "emancipation" or "liberation" for women.

One well-known billboard advertisement for a popular cigarette brand,
which can
be found on nearly every Johannesburg highway, features a young blond
woman
sitting on a park bench, with a lit cigarette in her hand. "Do I look
like I'd
cook you breakfast?" reads the caption.

Another, for the same brand, has a young, big-busted woman stepping out
of a
shower, her body glistening and a faint smile on her lips.

The caption: "Do I look shy?" According to freelance writer Ginger Otis,
who
has published work on the subject of women and tobacco advertising on
the
Internet newsgroup, Women's Wire, it would be easy to dismiss the
adverts as
"typical", were it not for the fact that the idea of equating women's
liberation and freedom with lighting a cigarette is still a new,
potentially
damaging image being flighted in countries unaccustomed to it.

The adverts, she says, appear to be "frighteningly effective at
convincing
young women that it is cool to smoke". The main problem of marketing
cigarettes
to developing countries is one of resources.

With many countries in Africa devoting most of their health resources to

fighting infectious diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis and, now,
HIV, such
countries often have what Otis calls "limited medical capacity and
little
infra- structure for early cancer detection, or other programmes to
limit the
harm of smoking".

According to the United States-based advocacy group, Tobacco Free,
smoking
poses various health risks to women that often prove more dangerous than
to
men. Women who smoke and use oral contraceptives, for instance, have an
increased risk of strokes and cancer, as well as high risks of
osteoporosis and
cervical cancer.

In addition, tobacco companies tend to market "light" brands to women -
which
have been proven to be associated with rare and potentially fatal tumors
in
lung tissue.

Nicola Christofides, a researcher at the WHP, says it is becoming
increasingly
evident that tobacco adverts are "gendered" in nature, and it is
necessary for
health workers to "disconnect concepts of gender equality and cigarette
smoking". She quotes the journal, Tobacco Reporter, which has reported
that
women smokers are likely to increase as the percentage of the total
number of
smokers. The journal attributes this to the fact that "women are
adopting more
dominant roles in society, and have increased their spending power".

All this, says Christofides, has made women a prime target for tobacco
advertisers.

The image of "smoking equals freedom", says Christofides, is aided by
the fact
that the advertising depicts sophisticated or trendy women smoking with
men - a
sign of "gender equality".

The new tobacco legislation, which comes into effect next April, aims to

regulate not only smoking habits, but tobacco advertising as well.

Among other things it will affect tobacco sponsorships for sports and
music
concerts. Advertising will also be stringently regulated.

According to Christofides, the new laws are a welcome step towards
decreasing
the numbers of young people, especially women, from smoking. "It is
clear from
tobacco industry documents that women are specifically being targeted. A

complete ban of advertising is therefore recommended as an integral part
of a
comprehensive, gender- sensitive tobacco control policy."