SCA condemns WHO’s plan to slash 40,000 jobs

Friday, September 21, 2012 - Peshawar—Sarhad Chamber of Agriculture, representing tobacco farmers, reacted with outrage to the publication of new proposals to regulate tobacco farming by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), vowing to rally its government to oppose the measures. “By suggesting governments phase out tobacco growing, these ideological recommendations put the jobs of more than forty thousand farmers at risk without providing them with any economically viable alternative crops,” said Ahsan Ullah Khan, President SCA “The WHO has consistently refused to listen to tobacco growers in drafting the proposals that directly impact Pakistan’s farmers. By doing so, they act like a blind man driving a steamroller without paying any attention to the consequences of their folly”

The current proposals go far beyond the FCTC’s original mandate. They are designed to force tobacco growers out of business by creating artificial restrictions on tobacco supply while failing to address the growing demand for the crop. This is being done through recommendations that seek to: Ban minimum support prices·