The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: Tobacco causes almost five million deaths annually and WHO estimates that approx. ten million people will die from the use of tobacco in the year 2020, and 70 percent of these live in developing countries. Tobacco smoking is the cause of approx. 30 percent of all cancer-related deaths worldwide.

The situation in Africa gives particular cause for concern. Today, Africa is the continent where the percentage of smokers is expected to increase most. The tobacco industry has intensified its efforts in Africa to try to get more people to start smoking. Tobacco smoking leads to health injuries, malnutrition (because families use large shares of their incomes to buy tobacco), deforestation and other social problems in Africa.

Methods: FCTC is very important as a tobacco control instrument in Africa as it requires each country, to prohibit all forms of tobacco advertising, introduce rules for the labelling of tobacco products with health warnings, to impose taxes and duties on tobacco, and prohibit sales to minors.

For this project NCS will collaborate with the NGO Framework Convention Alliance on Tobacco Control (FCA) and its members in sub Saharan Africa, to intensify efforts to help more African countries to ratify and implement FCTC. FCA will host capacity building workshops, legislative workshops, allocate funds to advocacy fellowships, hire a coordinator for the project in Uganda and also fund other activities in Africa.

Results: Increase the number of African countries that ratifies FCTC, and also to support the implementation process of FCTC in African countries.