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The WHO asks countries to stop the tobacco companies that try to wash their image as a green industry

2022-05-13T03:58:32.417Z


The international organization warns in a report of the serious environmental degradation that the global production of cigarettes entails


The World Health Organization (WHO) has asked all the governments of the world to prohibit the multinational tobacco companies from carrying out

greenwashing

practices that they carry out to try to rehabilitate their battered public image. .

Contrary to the green messages launched by the industry, the WHO has warned that tobacco not only harms human health —it is estimated that eight million people die each year from diseases related to this product—, but also has significant impacts on the environment and fuels climate change.

But this "environmental degradation" is often ignored by policymakers, as Rüdiger Krech recalled on Thursday,

WHO Director of Health Promotion.

This organization has stressed that governments have in their hands an instrument to put an end to these whitewashing practices, which are at the heart of corporate social responsibility and marketing campaigns

of multinationals in this sector: the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

This international agreement, signed in 2003 within the UN, already implies the prohibition of tobacco advertising.

The WHO's request to governments was made at a seminar organized together with STOP, an international control body for the tobacco sector.

“It is a very dangerous industry that not only kills humans but also the planet,” summed up Andy Rowell, a member of STOP and the University of Bath Tobacco Control Research Group.

Rowell has focused, among other issues, on the contribution to climate change of tobacco companies, which he does not usually link to the problem of global warming.

But, as stated in a report prepared for this seminar by the WHO and STOP, each year the tobacco companies are responsible for the emissions into the atmosphere of 80 million tons of carbon dioxide.

“The industry is trying to say that it is changing and that it is becoming more sustainable,” added Rowell.

"But from production to cigarette butts they have impacts."

To produce the six billion cigarettes that are manufactured each year, more than 22,000 million cubic meters of water are used, often in countries where this resource is already scarce, according to the joint report of these two organizations.

"22,000 million cubic meters is more than two and a half times the supply of water in the United Kingdom," explained Adriana Blanco, the head of the secretariat of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

"We are not talking about a small contribution to the problem, but a very large one," Blanco warned, referring to how the tobacco industry contributes to environmental degradation.

This impact on nature is "an additional reason to quit smoking," said Dr. María Neira, director of the WHO Environment and Public Health area.

green accreditations

“The tobacco industry has tried to whitewash its reputation through programs such as beach cleanups and funding of environmental and disaster relief organizations,” warns the report.

"This practice is especially done in low- and middle-income countries, which are targeted by tobacco companies to increase sales and profits," the study adds.

"This industry is taking an incalculable toll on the health of smokers, non-smokers and farmers."

But despite the warnings, greenwashing campaigns are still allowed.

The WHO has not limited itself to launching that request to governments to veto these practices.

It also puts a spotlight on environmental and sustainability accreditation organizations to stop endorsing “industry greenwashing” and giving “tobacco industry awards.”

The report recalls that there are more than 600 different corporate social responsibility schemes in the world that are not harmonized, so tobacco companies can choose the model that shows them the greenest of all.

In addition, they can provide the sustainability data that best suits them.

And, when they go down the wrong path for an accreditation body, they just leave it.

That was what happened with British American Tobacco (BAT),

More information

17 international experts to combat the climate greenwashing of companies

The battle against

greenwashing

or green face washing may be one of the most decisive in the coming years as social awareness of the environmental degradation of the planet due to human action increases.

Rare is the big company, no matter how dirty its business, that is not promising to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by mid-century.

But after these announcements, which are sometimes made under pressure from their investors, many times there are no solid or credible plans.

The situation is such that the Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, has launched a group of international experts who will try to combat these practices.

The objective is for these specialists to establish minimum criteria to be able to evaluate the climate promises of the so-called non-state actors, including companies.

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Source: elparis

All news articles on 2022-05-13

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