Kenya: President questioned on tobacco trade and cultivation

A bilateral trade deal with South Korea sees Kenya increase tobacco supplies, despite the president's pledge to reduce its cultivation. The Kenyan Alliance for Tobacco Control is calling on him to reverse the deal and promote food crops.

Several studies have shown that in most countries, and particularly in Kenya, tobacco cultivation benefits neither the farmers nor the states, but mainly the tobacco industry.[1]. This observation led to the continued eradication of tobacco cultivation being included in Kenya's Tobacco Control Act in 2007. In March 2022, the "Tobacco-Free Farms" project was launched in the west of the country by the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in collaboration with the Kenyan government.[2].

Despite this, Kenyan President Willam Ruto recently signed a bilateral agreement with South Korea to increase exports of tea, coffee and tobacco. Fearing that this would lead to an increase in the agricultural area devoted to tobacco, the Kenya Tobacco Control Alliance (KETCA) wrote to the President to hold him accountable and ask him to renege on the agreement.[3].

Farmers exposed to tobacco growing diseases

Drawing on scientific studies, KETCA highlighted the many disadvantages of tobacco farming: not only does it prevent Kenya's 55,000 tobacco farmers from escaping their structural poverty, but it exposes these workers to green tobacco disease and other conditions, and it puts a lot of pressure on resources environmental (land, water, forests).

Green tobacco disease is contracted by skin exposure to nicotine present on wet tobacco leaves. It is accompanied by many symptoms (nausea, vomiting, dizziness, headaches, chills, diarrhea, prostration, etc.) and affects children and pregnant women more. However, other diseases related to tobacco cultivation can occur, particularly those due to exposure to wood smoke during the drying and sanitation of tobacco leaves.

Tobacco growing less profitable than food crops

The low profitability of tobacco growing has been demonstrated, particularly in that it requires a very large workforce, which often forces farmers to employ their children. Many programmes run by the United Nations have proven that replacing tobacco plantations with food crops is more effective in reducing famine and extreme poverty, while limiting environmental damage and resource depletion. It is in this sense that the WHO has placed the next World No Tobacco Day under the banner of food self-sufficiency.[4].

Second country in the world, after Norway, to have ratified the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) in 2004, Kenya was also one of the first African countries to engage in a firm fight against smoking with its Tobacco Control Act in 2007. President Ruto, for his part, renewed his commitment to reducing non-communicable diseases, of which smoking is the primary cause.

To go further, read our case on tobacco cultivation in Africa.

Keywords: Kenya, trade, cultivation, green tobacco disease, WHO

M.F.

[1] Magati P, Lencucha R, Li Q, Drope J, Labonte R, Appau AB, Makoka D, Goma F, Zulu R. Costs, contracts and the narrative of prosperity: an economic analysis of smallholder tobacco farming livelihoods in Kenya. Tob Control. 2019 May;28(3):268-273.

[2] Launch of tobacco-free farms in Kenya, WHO, published March 23, 2022, accessed December 2, 2022.

[3] Saya M, Lobby wants state to reconsider decision on tobacco export, The Star, published December 1, 2022, accessed December 2, 2022.

[4] We need food, not tobacco – focus of World No Tobacco Day 2023, WHO, published November 7, 2022, accessed December 2, 2022.