In Benin, the fight against smoking hampered by trade agreements and industry interference

Benin faces various structural difficulties in implementing the anti-smoking provisions adopted, among other things due to international trade agreements. Pressure from the tobacco industry is also constant, for example by financing workshops that focus attention on illicit trade.

At the formal level, Benin seems to be in agreement with the principles of tobacco control. In 2005, the country ratified the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and in 2018 the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products. On December 18, 2017, it adopted Law 2017-27, which included numerous anti-smoking provisions; in particular, it established a ban on smoking in enclosed collective spaces, on advertising, promoting or sponsoring tobacco products, on selling tobacco to and by minors and on marketing tobacco products within an area protecting schools.

Structural and market barriers to tobacco control

However, the Beninese authorities are struggling to make these provisions effective. Despite the existence of an Anti-Tobacco Focal Point at the Ministry of Health, the lack of financial resources and the lack of awareness of the provisions of this law are among the most frequently highlighted obstacles. The bulk of the fight against smoking is left to the care of civil society. The latter, brought together within the platform of Civil Society Organizations engaged in the fight against tobacco in Benin, is at the origin of law 2017-27. Led by the NGO Initiative for Education and Tobacco Control (IECT), this platform recommends in particular the creation of an anti-tobacco office, in order to implement and coordinate the anti-tobacco policy[1].

As early as December 2011, in a report aimed at implementing the FCTC, Augustin Faton, executive director of the IECT, had also recommended increasing taxes on tobacco products by 30 % in order to make them less accessible.[2]. From 2011 to 2014, the member states of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) had also worked on this subject and issued two drafts for the taxation of tobacco products in 2014, which have since remained a dead letter. These projects were apparently restricted in particular by international trade agreements used by manufacturers to slow down the implementation of anti-smoking policies, in particular the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT). According to the Observatory for the Fight against Tobacco in French-speaking Africa (OTAF), the intensive lobbying exercised by British American Tobacco (BAT) among ECOWAS members also explains this freezing of taxation projects.[3].

The fight against smuggling is trying to replace the fight against tobacco

The tobacco industry is also maneuvering to divert attention from public health issues. In February 2022, several workshops were organized in different cities in Benin (Cotonou, Parakou, Abomey) “to equip the various actors involved in the fight against tobacco in Benin”Intended for magistrates, police officers, customs officers and representatives of the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, these workshops focused on illicit trade, while concealing the objectives of the fight against tobacco. Officially organized by the "Legal Tobacco Industry", these workshops would come from the National Tobacco and Match Company of Mali (Sonatam)[4]Having experienced difficulties following its deprivation in 2002, Sonatam entered into a partnership in 2017 with BAT and Imperial Brands, the first of these multinationals ensuring the revival of production and the second granting an investment of 10 billion CFA francs (15 million euros)[5].

However, the use of the threat of illicit trade to deter states from increasing their taxes on tobacco products is a strategy deployed by the tobacco industry in most countries, including the more industrialized. The challenge for cigarette manufacturers is also to prevent the establishment of a monitoring and traceability system independent of manufacturers as required by the protocol that Benin has ratified. The objective for them is to impose their own product monitoring system in order to keep control over legal and illegal markets.

Keywords: Benin, IECT, OTAF, BAT, illicit trade.

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[1] Tchokpodo M, Anti-tobacco fight in Benin: the NGO IECT calls for better application of law 2017-27, Miodjou, published on August 23, 2021, consulted on March 23, 2023.

[2] Mvondo PE, Faton A, Implementation of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in Benin, IECT, December 2011, 37 p.

[3] No to tobacco industry interference in public health policies in the ECOWAS region!, OTAF, published September 8, 2014, accessed March 23, 2023.

[4] Badarou A, Anti-tobacco fight in Benin: between lack of audacity and the straitjacket of trade agreements, Matin Libre, published on March 23, 2023, consulted on March 23, 2023.

[5] Mali: strategic agreement, Le Monde du Tabac, published September 12, 2017, consulted March 23, 2023.