Growers want place at COP7

The African division of the International Tobacco Growers’ Association (ITGA) has expressed concern at reports of plans to ban dozens of ‘appointed and elected officials from executive, legislative and judicial branches’ representing tobacco-growing countries from participating in the meeting of the seventh Conference of the Parties (COP7) to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, according to a Vanguard story.

COP7 is scheduled to take place in Delhi, India, in November.

Previously, the ITGA had backed a call by the Tobacco Institute of India to allow tobacco industry stakeholders, including growers, to participate in the conference, according to a story by Amiti Sen for the Hindu Business Line, relayed by the TMA.

The ITGA president Francois Van Der Merwe had said that measures impacting tobacco cultivation and tobacco farmers could not be decided only by health officials and activists.

ITGA members from North America, South America, India, Europe, Africa, South Africa and Indonesia were in New Delhi for a two-day seminar ahead of COP7.

Merwe said that despite several representations from the ITGA, the FCTC was not allowing the association to participate in the meeting; and he said that this wasn’t right.

He said the adoption of “extreme measures” would directly and severely affect the livelihood of millions of tobacco farmers and farm workers around the world.