Brazil has charged a tobacco exporter with using slave labor, reports Reuters. The case comes after labor inspectors found nine workers, including children, living in poor condition on a farm in Venancio Aires, Rio Grande do Sul. The workers were allegedly paid less than a third of Brazil’s minimum wage. They also lacked protective gear, leaving them exposed to high concentrations of nicotine.
The tobacco exporter countered that the farm’s owner was responsible for hiring. The company said it conducts its operations in accordance with Brazilian legislation and has programs to fight child labor.
Under Brazil’s integrated tobacco production system, exporters provide credit, seeds and equipment to leaf growers in exchange for exclusive rights to the farm output. Production contracts allow merchants to audit the farm and dictate how to develop the crops. Labor inspectors insists this degree of control makes companies responsible for the working conditions at the farms they contract.
“The industry’s current position of not being responsible for the illegal exploitation of the workforce … has to be faced,” said labor inspector Leandro Vagliati. “The companies have to be called to account,”
Brazil’s definition of slavery includes not only as forced labor but also as debt bondage, degrading work conditions, long hours that pose a risk to health and any work that violates human dignity.
Since its creation in 1995, Brazil’s anti-slavery taskforce has found more than 55,000 people in slavery-like conditions.
If found guilty of using slave labor after a government review, the accused tobacco exporter could be added to Brazil’s “dirty list” of companies that have engaged in slave labor.
Companies remain on the list for two years and are barred during that period from receiving state loans. The list is also used by international buyers concerned about supply chains.
The report sets out the pillars of JT Group’s human rights strategy, which is an essential part of the group’s business activities and one of three absolute requirements of its sustainability strategy.
“This important milestone for the U.N. and the global business community is an opportunity to highlight our progress and the ongoing process of embedding human rights into every area of our business,” said Masamichi Terabatake, president and CEO of JT Group, in a statement.
The tobacco industry in Brazil has made great strides in its battle against child labor, SindiTabaco announced on the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) World Day Against Child Labor on June 10.
SindiTabaco launched its “The Future is Now” program in 1998—four years before the ILO debuted World Day Against Child Labor.
Today, the tobacco sector is the only one to require proof of school enrollment of its farmers’ school-age children. Tobacco companies will renew production contracts with growers only if they can present a certificate of school attendance.
According to SindiTabaco president Iro Schuenke, the first actions intended to create awareness of the importance of school attendance. “At that time, the companies got organized in contact with the municipalities in order to actively solve one-off questions related to school evasion, mainly caused by the lack of schools or deficient transport systems affecting farmers’ children,” he explains.
As the years went by, these initiatives evolved and gave rise to the Growing Up Right Institute, which has already benefited 500 teenagers in rural areas. The institute pioneered professional learning programs for the young in the countryside, qualifying adolescents through rural management and entrepreneurship courses.
“For most of the young, besides being an opportunity for developing their skills without having to leave their communities, it is also their first formal job, as the program complies with the learning law, and the young participants receive a salary proportional to 20 hours a week,” says Schuenke, who is also the director president of the Growing Up Right Institute. “It is a manner for them to spend their time in the course and at school, far away from tasks inappropriate for their age.”
Kim Sam-soo, chairman of the Leaf Tobacco Production Cooperative (left), and Shin Song-ho, head of KT&G’s raw materials division (right), at the delivery ceremony in Daejeon on May 25 (Photo: KT&G)
KT&G delivered KRW400 million ($358,338) in welfare-promotion funds to continue its co-prosperity program with domestic leaf tobacco farmers. The contribution will be used to cover medical examination costs for 960 elderly leaf tobacco farmers and to provide scholarships to 85 children from farming families.
According to KT&G, farmers are struggling to secure labor due to the continued decline in the rural population and the Covid-19 crisis. Leaf tobacco cultivation is labor intensive due to difficulties in mechanizing, and tobacco farmers are generally older than other farmers, requiring greater attention to healthcare.
KT&G has been providing welfare support to leaf tobacco farmers annually since 2013. Thus far this year, the company has donated KRW2.85 billion. Nearly 8,000 farmers have received medical checkup fees and scholarships for their children.
As part of its ESG management, KT&G has initiated various projects to help its farmers. KT&G says it is the only domestic tobacco company that purchases its farmers’ entire harvests to protect their livelihoods. In addition, each year, company employees volunteer to help farmers with leaf tobacco transplantation and harvest. Also, KT&G pays 30 percent of each farmer’s sales in cash up front.
“We are continuing the project to support farmers’ welfare to solve their difficulties and provide practical help,” said Shin Song-ho, head of KT&G’s raw materials division, in a statement. “I hope this support will help farmers improve their health and economic conditions. We will continue to give back to society.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has modified an existing “Withhold Release Order” on imports of tobacco from Malawi.
Effective May 21, 2021, certain tobacco imports from Premium Tobacco Malawi Limited (PTML) will be admissible at all U.S. ports of entry. This modification applies only to tobacco harvested by club growers in Malawi. CBP previously prohibited the entry of these imports into the United States based on reasonable suspicion that they were produced using forced labor.
CBP issued a Withhold Release Order on tobacco imports from Malawi in November 2019 due to information reasonably indicating that the tobacco is produced using forced labor and forced child labor. The Withhold Release Order continues to apply to imports of tobacco from Malawi by any company that has not demonstrated to CBP that its supply chain is free of forced labor.
CBP modified the November 2019 Withhold Release Order based on a rigorous evaluation of PTML’s social compliance program and efforts to identify and minimize the risks of forced labor in its supply chain. These actions produced evidence that sufficiently supports PTML’s claims that tobacco from club growers (smallholder growers that use little or no farm worker labor) is not grown and harvested using forced labor or forced child labor.
“CBP’s forced labor enforcement efforts continue to effect positive change for workers around the globe,” said John Leonard, acting executive assistant commissioner of CBP’s Office of Trade. “Eliminating forced labor from our supply chains prevents the abuse of vulnerable workers, safeguards the competitiveness of law-abiding businesses and protects consumers from unethically made products.”
This is the third time that CBP has modified the Withhold Release Order on tobacco from Malawi. The agency modified the Withhold Release Order in June 2020 to allow imports of tobacco from Alliance One International and again in August 2020 to allow imports of tobacco from Limbe Leaf Tobacco Co. Both entities fully addressed CBP’s concerns about the use of forced labor in their production processes.
STOP, a global tobacco industry watchdog, has sent a letter to the United Nations asking the organization to remove the Eliminating Child Labour in Tobacco-Growing (ECLT) foundation as a participant in the U.N. Global Compact.
“We, the undersigned civil society representatives,” the letter reads, “request that the Eliminating Child Labour in Tobacco-Growing Foundation (ECLT) be removed as a participant to the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), in accordance with U.N. policies, including UNGC’s 2017 policy update, the Model Policy for Agencies of the United Nations System on Preventing Tobacco Industry Interference (Model Policy), and the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (U.N. SDGs), which embody the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC). ECLT has undeniable ties with the tobacco industry and has failed in its stated objective of ending child labor in tobacco—a problem directly linked to the exploitative business practices of its funders and members.”
STOP cites the ECLT’s connection to tobacco manufacturers and producers as the main reason it should be removed from the UNGC. According to STOP, the tobacco industry’s interest are irreconcilable with the interest of human rights and sustainable development goals and are antithetical to the UNGC’s mission.
“We urge UNGC to act according to its mandate, practice good governance and align its policies with those of U.N. agencies, international bodies and member states that accord with WHO FCTC Article 5.3 and work to protect policy, health and development objectives by rejecting partnerships and interactions with the tobacco industry and its allies. End ECLT’s participation in UNGC,” the authors write.
Jennie Galbraith discusses British American Tobacco’s human rights initiatives
By Stefanie Rossel
In December 2020, British American Tobacco (BAT) became the first tobacco company to launch a human rights report. Tobacco Reporter spoke with Jennie Galbraith, the company’s head of environmental, social and governance (ESG), who is responsible for overseeing the development and implementation of BAT’s sustainability agenda and leads the group’s ESG engagement with investors.
Jennie Galbraith
Tobacco Reporter: Your company has been engaged in the field of human rights (HR) since 2000, with measures and achievements previously being reported in your corporate social responsibility reports. Why have you decided to publish a separate HR report?
Jennie Galbraith: We have a long-standing commitment to respect the human rights of our employees, the people we work with and the communities in which we operate. We have achieved a lot over the last 20 years, and we are setting the bar even higher. The HR report presents the progress we have made, highlights our ongoing work and outlines our plans for the future. This report is aligned with the United Nations Guiding Principles Reporting Framework, which provides comprehensive guidance for companies to report on how they respect human rights in accordance with the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights. We also wanted to publish a human rights-focused report to provide our stakeholders with more in-depth information on our ambitions and our efforts to assist in addressing impacts across our global business and supply chain. We are proud to be the first company among our peers to publish such a report.
What are the most pressing HR issues in your tobacco supply chain?
Temporary workers, use of family labor in small-scale farming and high levels of rural poverty make agriculture a particularly vulnerable sector for human rights risks.
For example, according to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, poverty can lead to farmers taking their children out of school to work on the land or to overlook health and safety standards. That is why enhancing farmer livelihoods is central to our approach to achieving our goal of eliminating child and forced labor by 2025.
We have robust policies in place outlining our commitment to preventing child labor and exploitation of labor, underpinned by due diligence, monitoring and remediation programs. We also know that human rights issues in agricultural supply chains are very complex and cannot be single-handedly solved by one company alone. So, we adopt a collaborative approach. For example, it has been 20 years since BAT became a founding member of the Eliminating Child Labor in Tobacco Growing (ECLT) Foundation.
We support our directly contracted farmers in a number of other ways. This includes education and training on the latest sustainable agricultural methods, including new seed varieties that improve yields, and support with diversifying their crop to provide additional income and enhance food security. For example, in 2020, 93 percent of tobacco farmers in our supply chain reported growing other crops, including fruit, vegetables, maize and soy. We also provide our contracted farmers with training to help build their skills, knowledge and awareness on a range of topics—from human rights and health and safety to farm business management and women’s empowerment. For example, in 2020, 2,887 women’s empowerment training sessions were held, with 16,658 attendances.
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In your report, an external sustainability expert on HR issues singled out three emerging and interlinked issues that will affect tobacco farmers in the near future: the changing climate, women’s empowerment and the need for alternative incomes. Of the three, climate change is likely to have the most far-reaching impact. What measures is BAT taking to tackle this issue?
To address climate change, we provide all our contracted farmers with a wide range of best practice environmental information and training as well as introducing them to sustainable farming practices and technologies, developed by our global leaf agronomy research. Beyond the farmers we contract directly with, we have long-term strategic partnerships with many of our third-party suppliers, and we expect them to provide the farmers they source from with similar support services. The Sustainable Tobacco Program (STP), an industry-wide initiative, sets the standard we expect from all our tobacco suppliers worldwide. The STP is aligned to international standards, including those of the International Labor Organization and the UN Guiding Principles, and it is our policy that all our leaf operations and third-party suppliers participate in the program.
Examples of our sustainable farming initiatives include sustainable fuels and curing technologies to help preserve forest resources and methods to reduce agrochemical use and preserve soil health. For example, since 2016, 99 percent of wood used by our contracted farmers for curing fuels has been from sustainable sources. We also support our farmers in using water more efficiently. In Pakistan, for example, drip irrigation technology has helped reduce farmers’ water use by up to 40 percent.
Sustainable farming practices not only bring environmental benefits; they also help to build farmers’ resilience to the impact of climate change. In some countries, we also facilitate crop insurance for our contracted farmers. This can be crucial in providing a safety net for unexpected events and natural disasters, such as floods and droughts.
Please explain the minimum standards expected from suppliers.
At a minimum, the standards we expect regarding human rights from our suppliers in relation to their own employees and contractors—including permanent, temporary, contract agency workers and migrant workers—include that they:
Provide equal opportunities to, and fair treatment of, all workers
Work to eliminate any form of harassment and bullying within the workplace, whether it is of a sexual, verbal, nonverbal or physical nature
Provide a safe working environment, adopt procedures to identify and address workplace health and safety risks, implement safe working practices and provide, where relevant, appropriate personal protective equipment to prevent occupational injuries or illnesses
Provide fair wages and benefits, which comply at least with applicable minimum wage legislation and other applicable wage and working time laws or collective bargaining agreements
Ensure operations are free from child labor. Specifically, following the guidelines of the International Labor Organization that any work that is considered hazardous or likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children should not be done by anyone under the age of 18 (or 16 under strict conditions); the minimum age for work should not be below the legal age for finishing compulsory schooling and, in any case, not less than the age of 15; where local law permits, children between the ages of 13 and 15 years old may do light work, provided it does not hinder their education or vocational training, or include any activity that could be harmful to their health or development—for example, handling mechanical equipment or agrochemicals. We also recognize training or work experience schemes approved by a competent authority as an exception.
Ensure operations are free from exploitation of labor. Specifically, ensuring their operations are free from slavery, servitude and forced, compulsory, bonded, involuntary, trafficked or unlawful migrant labor.
Ensure the right to freedom of association. Specifically, ensuring all workers are able—subject to applicable laws—to exercise their right to freedom of association and collective bargaining, including the right to be represented by recognized trade unions or other bona fide representatives.
Ensure responsible sourcing of “conflict minerals,” including cobalt, gold, tantalum, tin and tungsten, and the ores from which they originate, originating from conflict-affected and high-risk areas that could directly or indirectly finance or benefit armed groups or human rights abuses. Where products or materials supplied to the group contain such minerals, suppliers should work to exercise appropriate due diligence and perform a reasonable country of origin inquiry, including requiring its suppliers to engage in similar due diligence.
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How has the Covid-19 pandemic impacted on your HR programs and efforts?
With the pandemic bringing human rights into even sharper focus, it is imperative that we continue to work in partnership with others to support communities that may be particularly vulnerable to both the virus and its long-term economic implications. For example, we are supporting tobacco-growing communities and have worked to keep farms and trading floors operating safely, have distributed personal protective equipment and other essential items, and in countries such as Kenya, we have enhanced access to clean water and hand-washing facilities.
We have continued to strive to do more despite the pandemic and have set ourselves ambitious targets. We aim for our tobacco supply chain to be free of forced and child labor by 2025. I believe our purpose-led strategy and focus on delivering a better tomorrow have put us in a better position to manage these issues and to support our people and partners around the world.
Something that’s also been in the news a lot is the Covid-19 vaccine candidate, developed by BAT’s U.S. bio-tech arm, Kentucky BioProcessing (KBP). We are proud to play our part in the global fight against this virus and—hopefully—we can contribute to the solution.
What developments do you expect for 2021 as the pandemic continues to affect the world? What further measures will BAT take to support its farmers and suppliers?
With the U.N. Climate Change Conference and the U.N. Biodiversity Conference both set to take place this year, the “E” in ESG will continue to be a prominent feature on business agendas. But this does not mean human rights will be taking a back seat. There will be a keen focus on human rights and the impact of the pandemic on progress in this area. In addition to the normal economic challenges facing rural communities, there are fears that Covid-19 could increase poverty, and this could lead to more incidents of child labor. We believe this is a very real risk and are calling on everyone involved in global agriculture supply chains to look at child and forced labor solutions differently.
For our part, we will continue our well-established support for our contracted farmers and suppliers across the world, focusing on strong policies, extensive due-diligence and effective remediation to create shared value for all. We continuously work to improve and strengthen our approach, including examining new ways to train our field technicians to help them identify child labor risks and spot early warning signs, how we can better address root causes and how we can help improve farmer livelihoods.
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While you have made significant progress in the tobacco supply chain as far as HR are concerned, your New Categories portfolio presents challenges different from those in the leaf supply chain. What are these challenges, and how are you addressing human rights?
Our supply chain for our New Category business can have many layers of suppliers between the raw materials and the final product. This complexity can increase risks for both the security of supply and human rights. We are focused on mapping our supply chain and building relationships with critical lower-tier suppliers. All our tier 1 New Category suppliers are subject to our supply chain due diligence program, including human rights risk assessments and independent audits of workplace conditions. Since 2018, this has included tier 2 suppliers too. Suppliers are prioritized for audits based on the level of risk identified, against independent human rights indices developed by Verisk Maplecroft. We conduct an annual risk assessment on 100 percent of our existing materials suppliers. In addition, before we start working with a new product materials supplier, it must undergo an independent audit performed by our partner, Intertek.
We also need to monitor closely for conflict minerals in our electronic supply chain. The main challenge here is that the mines are often many layers away from BAT, meaning that we do not have control over their activities. However, we are committed to responsible mineral sourcing as outlined in our Supplier Code of Conduct. In 2019, we implemented new due diligence procedures, aligned to the OECD’s internationally recognized guidelines for responsible mineral supply chains. Last year, we published our first Conflict Minerals Report.
In our first year of monitoring for conflict minerals, we were pleased by the strong level of engagement from our suppliers, with a 100 percent response to our due diligence enquiries. The suppliers were at varying levels of maturity in implementing their own conflict minerals due diligence. We are working with all the suppliers concerned to help them address these gaps and support them in building capacity and strengthening due diligence measures.
Stefanie Rossel is Tobacco Reporter’s editorial contributor. An experienced trade journalist, she combines sharp reporting skills with in-depth knowledge of the tobacco and vapor industries. Prior to joining Tobacco Reporter, Stefanie was editor-in-chief at Tobacco Journal International, where she worked for a decade. Fluent in English, German and French, Stefanie covers tobacco news around the world. She is based in Germany.
Youth empowerment, the main objective of the Growing Up Right Institute, is a key element for transformation in Brazil.
By Stefanie Rossel
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The United Nations has declared 2021 the International Year for the Elimination of Child Labor. Although child labor decreased by 38 percent in the past decade, it still affects 152 million children worldwide. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), around 70 percent of child laborers work in the agricultural sector. Tobacco cultivation plays an inglorious role in this issue—child labor still occurs in developing countries, such as Malawi and Indonesia, but also in rich countries, such as the United States.
Brazil, the world’s No. 2 tobacco producer, which in 2020 exported $1.4 billion in leaf, according to Statista data, is familiar with the issue too. In 2008, the country barred children under 18 from any work with tobacco and imposed penalties for child labor violations for farmers, factories and companies that purchase tobacco leaves from fields that employ children. Through extensive information campaigns, the government has raised tobacco farmers’ awareness about the hazards of nicotine and pesticide exposure, particularly for children. Despite the country’s understaffed labor ministry and lack of resources to carry out sufficient inspections, Brazil has been praised for its progress in addressing the problem.
“The tobacco sector is, without any doubt, a model of child labor eradication in the rural areas in Brazil,” says Iro Schünke , president of the Growing Up Right Institute (Istituto Crescer Legal, or ICL). “The fact has already been acknowledged by the ILO. For over two decades, we have been fighting the problem, and it is no exclusivity of the tobacco sector in the rural area.”
Between 2000 and 2010, the greatest reductions in child labor reduction took place on smallholder tobacco farms, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. During that decade, the sector lowered the rate of child labor in the tobacco supply chain by 58 percent in Rio Grande do Sul, even as the area dedicated to tobacco cultivation doubled. The national average reduction of child labor, Schünke points out, is 10 percent.
Numerous awareness initiatives on farmers’ health and safety and child and adolescents’ protection, launched by Brazil’s tobacco industry since 2009, have contributed to this development. According to Schünke , the tobacco industry is the only agricultural sector in Brazil to require school enrollment forms and school attendance certificates of school-age children as a condition for the renewal of commercial contracts with farmers.
“The main challenge to the theme in the rural area, especially in family farming, is a cultural question,” says Schünke . “During all those years of holding seminars, we perceived a feeling of great anxiety among the farmers about what to do with their children once they conclude their elementary school. The shortage of rural schools is just another problem in the rural area and, along with the problem of drugs and idleness, the parents end up contributing toward a cultural viewpoint that places great value on work, thus encouraging the children and adolescents to engage in activities inappropriate for their age.”
Creating better chances
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Awareness work was necessary to help parents place greater value on education while public policies were needed to strengthen the schools in rural areas, according to Schünke . In 2015, SindiTabaco, Brazil’s Interstate Tobacco Industry Union, and its associate companies established the ICL. Supported by experts and organizations involved with education and the fight against child labor, the initiative provides young people with opportunities in rural areas.
It is currently focused on southern Brazil—a major tobacco cultivation region—and provides children between the ages of 14 and 17 who want to follow in the footsteps of their tobacco-growing parents with training programs in rural administration and entrepreneurship. The curriculum includes studies of the rural properties, diagnosis of the municipality and region based on the local productive arrangements, mapping of local partnerships and strategic alliances. It also involves the development of group work, engaging the families and communities, as well as product creation and viability studies.
The adolescents are hired as apprentices by tobacco companies and are remunerated in compliance with the country’s learning law. Instead of working, the participants carry out theoretical and practical activities within the premises of the school, geared toward the reality of their families and communities, thus stimulating life projects and personal development without leaving the rural areas. Exclusively focused on rural management and entrepreneurship, there is no training relative to any specific type of rural activity, not even tobacco, Schünke explains. “The young are provided with tools to think about their life projects, whether in the rural setting or in town, with an eye on sustainability.”
The training takes place in the shift opposite regular school hours and comprises 900 hours of tuition in one year. “The young apprentices [enjoy] the same benefits as the apprentices in town,” says Schünke . “This is a way to keep them away from inappropriate activities for their age and, at the same time, provide them or their families with a source of income,” says Schünke . “The course also provides the adolescents with a new vision on the countryside—they come to know about possibilities that have not yet been explored by their family members; they come to grips with the value of the land and acknowledge the farm as business. “Within this context, it is not a rare thing to see a change in the way some young people look at the rural activities and at the countless chances to do business in the countryside, whether as farmers, service providers, educators or leaders in their communities, for example.”
Rural exodus is a major issue in Brazil, which is one of the most urbanized countries in Latin America. According to Statista, almost 87 percent of the population lived in cities in 2019; their share has continuously increased over the past decade.
Toward more gender equality
In its six years of operation, nearly 500 young people have benefited from the ICL’s rural professional learning program. The initiative, says Schünke , has gained momentum at national and international levels. “When they finish the course, the youth are more qualified to understand that it is through qualification and education that they can improve their quality of life. Furthermore, they are in a better position to understand which tasks are appropriate to their respective age and the importance of their extended and continuing education, carrying on with their studies of both their elementary education and higher education. As a result, they are better prepared to make their choices for the future and engage in professional work as soon as they achieve the minimum age required.”
Apart from the training program, the institute offers courses focused on gender equality and on entrepreneurship in education. “Us for Them—The Female Voice in the Countryside” is a program designed to develop the communication skills of young rural girls. One of its objectives is to keep all rural communities informed through local radio programs. “Four editions of the program have already been conducted, starting in 2017, focused on former girl students of the rural professional learning program.”
In 2020, the institute launched a pilot of its program “Good Practices in Entrepreneurship for Education” in the municipality of Cangucu, Rio Grande do Sul. The initiative consists of sharing methodological tools tested and approved by the pedagogical team of the Growing Up Right Institute with the aim to qualify teachers able to multiply these practices geared toward administration and entrepreneurship.
For the time being, all the activities take place exclusively in Rio Grande do Sul, Schünke says. “We have plans to extend the activities of the institute to other tobacco growing regions in Brazil.”
Stefanie Rossel is Tobacco Reporter’s editorial contributor. An experienced trade journalist, she combines sharp reporting skills with in-depth knowledge of the tobacco and vapor industries. Prior to joining Tobacco Reporter, Stefanie was editor-in-chief at Tobacco Journal International, where she worked for a decade. Fluent in English, German and French, Stefanie covers tobacco news around the world. She is based in Germany.
The United Kingdom is considering a plan to force big tobacco companies to pay the annual cost of cleaning up discarded cigarette butts.
The move comes after fresh evidence reveals that cleaning up littered cigarette butts currently costs U.K. local authorities around £40 million ($55 million) per year. Despite smoking rates being at their lowest recorded level, cigarette filters continue to be the most littered item in England.
Among the options being looked at by ministers is a regulatory extended producer responsibility scheme for cigarette butts in England, a new power currently being legislated for in the environment bill. This would require the tobacco industry to pay the full disposal costs of tobacco waste products, ensuring the sector takes sufficient financial responsibility for the litter its products create.
“Cigarette butts are a blight on our communities, littering our streets or ending up washed down the drain and polluting our rivers and oceans,” said Environment Minister Rebecca Pow in a government press note. “We must all take action to protect our environment. We are committed to making sure that the tobacco industry plays its part. That is why we are exploring how cigarette companies can be held fully accountable for the unsightly scourge of litter created by their products.”
We must all take action to protect our environment. We are committed to making sure that the tobacco industry plays its part.
“We are making excellent progress in our ambition to be a smoke-free country by 2030, with smoking rates at a record low,” said Public Health Minister Jo Churchill. “While this is making a substantial impact on the public health of the country, the environmental impact of smoking due to cigarette butt and package littering is still a major issue.”
According to Keep Britain Tidy research, smoking-related litter is the most prevalent form of litter in England, making up 68 percent of all littered items and found on around 80 percent of surveyed sites.
Most cigarette butts are single-use plastic and contain hundreds of toxic chemicals once smoked. Littered cigarette filters can persist in the environment for many years and release these chemicals to air, land and water, harming plant growth and wildlife.
According to the Litter Strategy for England, the most effective way to tackle smoking-related litter is by reducing the prevalence of smoking in the first place. The government is committed and will publish a new tobacco control plan for England later this year to deliver its ambition of a smoke-free country by 2030.
The environment bill will allow the government to legislate for extended producer responsibility schemes, which could be applied to tobacco products. Cigarette and tobacco product packaging is already covered by the proposed packaging producer responsibility scheme, which is currently undergoing a second phase of consultation.
At the September roundtable on smoking-related litter, Pow encouraged parties to consider whether a nonregulatory producer responsibility scheme could be developed for tobacco waste products. Having considered further evidence, the government has decided that a regulatory approach may be required to ensure that the industry takes sufficient financial responsibility for the litter created by its products and to prevent them from undermining public health policy.
Indonesia commits to eliminating all forms of child labor by 2022.
By Stefanie Rossel
Child labor affected an estimated 152 million children globally in 2018. It’s also present in Indonesia, which in 2002 committed to eliminating all forms of child labor by 2022 to fulfill global development pledges. Over the past four decades, the island state has developed from one of the world’s poorest countries into a low-to-middle income nation with a poverty rate in the single digits. Progress has also been made in the elimination of child labor. According to the United Nations, the number of child workers declined from more than 4 million in 2009 to 2.9 million in 2018. Today, 7.4 percent of Indonesian children are working, mostly in agriculture. Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering the size of the tobacco sector in Indonesia, an estimated 60 percent of them labor in the tobacco sector.
In a recent report, the U.S. Department of Labor (DoL) attested Indonesia had made “moderate advancement” in 2019 in its efforts to eradicate the worst forms of child labor, which include commercial sexual exploitation and performing dangerous tasks in plantation agriculture. In addition to publishing a report with the most recent data on child labor, Indonesia’s government had increased its labor inspectorate funding from $10.2 million in 2018 to $16.7 million in 2019, with specific funds allocated to enforcing child labor regulations, according to the DoL. The country’s Ministry of Manpower, however, still lacked the financial and staff resources to fully enforce child labor laws throughout the country, the DoL study found, and there was no information available on the number of investigations conducted, violations found, prosecutions initiated and convictions secured.
Although Indonesia has ratified the key international conventions concerning child labor, 3.7 percent of the country’s 10-year-olds to 14-year-olds are working, the DoL report said. The majority (61.6 percent) work in agriculture where they fulfill tasks such as harvesting kernels for palm oil or applying fertilizer to tobacco. Many of them work long hours in extreme heat, a condition also considered hazardous for children. The minimum age for work in Indonesia is 15 years and that for hazardous work is 18.
Several institutions have been established to enforce child labor laws. The Ministry of Manpower, for example, provides legal information to employers and works with law enforcement officials to investigate and address instances of child labor. The Ministry of Women Empowerment and Child Protection coordinates the provision of social services to children, including those involved in child labor. Labor inspectors are regularly trained; they are authorized to conduct unannounced inspections and assess penalties. To coordinate its efforts down to the local level, the government has established regional action committees and task forces at provincial and district levels. A National Plan of Action (NPA) provides a framework for the elimination of child labor, whereas a roadmap toward a child labor-free Indonesia in 2022 supports implementation of the NPA for the elimination of the worst forms of child labor. Social programs provide block grants for schools and cash transfer programs.
Difficult mission
Karina Jabulatova
Despite increased efforts, eradicating child labor within the next two years will be a tall order, in part due to the country’s demographic and geographical particularities. With 267 million people, Indonesia is the world’s fourth most populous country. Its 17,508 islands make it the largest archipelago in the world. Half of the population lives in Java. Agriculture employs roughly one-third of the workforce.
The country is also the world’s second-largest cigarette market, after China, and ranks fifth among global top tobacco producers. Six million Indonesians are involved in the tobacco industry. Smoking prevalence is high, standing at 29 percent among people aged 15 and older. Indonesia also struggles with significant child smoking. In 2018, the Health Ministry reported 0.7 percent of children between the ages of 10 and 14 were smokers.
“There are many challenges, the most recent one being the Covid-19 pandemic. We are supporting the government in the implementation of child labor-free policies, and maintaining this positive relationship with the government is always a priority for us,” says Karima Jambulatova, executive director of the Eliminating Child Labor in Tobacco-Growing (ECLT) Foundation, which is present in the country as a founding member of the Partnership for Action Against Child Labor (PAACLA) and its Kesempatan project.
The latter project was initiated in 2019 in five districts in East Java Province and West Nusa Tenggara Province—Indonesia’s largest tobacco planting areas—to reduce the prevalence of child labor in the agriculture sector. At the subnational level, the program advocates child-friendly villages through engagement with local institutions, information dissemination for members of the village community, including farmers and farm workers, and activities for children. The PAACLA partnership works toward eliminating all forms of child labor by 2025 in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and is coordinated by the government. According to the ECLT, this cross-sector initiative promotes shared accountability and strong commitments necessary to mitigate the risk of child labor and promote sustainable change.
Stephanie Garde
To support the government’s efforts, ECLT closely cooperates with various stakeholders and helps by providing models and best practices. “Our project in Indonesia focuses on prevention of child labor, on protecting children’s needs and rights and on increased commitment in the villages,” says Stephanie Garde, ECLT’s program manager. “The child-friendly village approach modeled from the namesake government program and implemented by the project includes activity centers where children get support doing their homework or do sports and other educational activities instead of hanging around the fields.”
Child labor in Indonesia usually occurs in informal settings, whereas laws and conventions are better placed to cover formal employment, Jambulatova explains. “The problem with child labor on smallholder farms, where income-generating crops like tobacco are grown alongside food crops, is that the whole family often goes to work to meet their needs,” she says. “Obviously, there is no employment contract between children and their parents. ECLT’s programs are designed to not simply remove children from child labor in one supply chain but to adopt a more systemic response focusing on cross-sector collaboration and multistakeholder engagement, which support government efforts to make sure no child is left behind.”
When talking about child labor, it is necessary to understand its nature. “The causes of child labor are far-reaching and complex, including poverty and lack of access to quality education and infrastructure,” says Jambulatova. “As with anything that affects the way people live, these issues become part of cultural practices as well, meaning that encouraging change also requires investment in awareness-raising to shift mindsets. To bring long-lasting change for children and their families, we need to understand the root causes of child labor and how they relate to each other in a wider system.”
A question of awareness
Eradicating child lavor is made more challenging due to farmers’ heavy dependence on the tobacco. There is less government support available to diversify their incomes with complementary crops than in other countries. What’s more, most farmers in Indonesia also don’t own the land they cultivate. During the harvesting season, it is common that neighbors come with their children and help.
Elimination of child labor is further complicated by the structure of the Indonesian tobacco market. While leading multinational manufacturers and leaf merchants are members of the ECLT and PAACLA and have committed themselves to keep their farms free of child labor, some of the domestic companies still have work to do. Moreover, a large number of “free” tobacco farmers sell their tobacco to traders and middlemen, which makes tracing within supply chains more difficult. Many small-scale farmers prefer selling their tobacco to these middlemen as they can sometimes offer higher prices than those fixed at the beginning of a season through contract farming.
ECLT member companies represent only approximately 35 percent of the tobacco sector in Indonesia. There is, however, progress among domestic manufacturers. “Some national companies are moving to vertical integration, with suppliers to these companies also opening up to this,” says Jambulatova. “PAACLA presents a unique opportunity for national companies to form a part of a partnership for the elimination of child labor specifically in Indonesia to step up to the challenge and close the gaps for sustainable change.”
As in many countries, tobacco in Indonesia is grown only during a short period of the year. During the remaining months, the farmers cultivate other crops, such as rice. “This is why we can’t limit our support to farmers to the tobacco supply chain only,” says Jambulatova. “It’s not a supply chain issue but an agricultural issue. Until there are collaboration and investment to address root causes and fight child labor across crops, we risk simply pushing children out of tobacco fields and into another crop down the road or during another season.
“The fact that this is a global issue across regions and industries shows that no one actor can solve this alone. Our long-term strategic vision is to engage across crops and levels building commitments and coordination that support economic growth for thriving farming communities free of child labor. We invite the government, companies and other industries to renew and deepen commitments so that we can reach this necessary goal as fast as the UN Sustainable Development Goals demand.”
Stefanie Rossel is Tobacco Reporter’s editorial contributor. An experienced trade journalist, she combines sharp reporting skills with in-depth knowledge of the tobacco and vapor industries. Prior to joining Tobacco Reporter, Stefanie was editor-in-chief at Tobacco Journal International, where she worked for a decade. Fluent in English, German and French, Stefanie covers tobacco news around the world. She is based in Germany.
