On May 31, 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) sounded the alarm on the tobacco industry's devastating environmental impact, highlighting the need for greater accountability and action to mitigate its effects.
The WHO report 'Tobacco: Poisoning our planet' reveals that the industry's carbon footprint from production, processing, and transporting tobacco is equivalent to one-fifth of the CO2 produced by the commercial airline industry each year, further contributing to global warming.
According to Dr. Ruediger Krech, Director of Health Promotion at WHO, 'Tobacco products are the most littered item on the planet, containing over 7,000 toxic chemicals, which leech into our environment when discarded.' He added that roughly 4.5 trillion cigarette filters pollute our oceans, rivers, city sidewalks, parks, soil, and beaches every year.
The WHO report also highlights the industry's destruction of forests, with the majority of tobacco being grown in low- and middle-income countries where water and farmland are desperately needed to produce food for the region.
The costs of cleaning up littered tobacco products fall on taxpayers, rather than the industry creating the problem. Each year, this costs China roughly US$ 2.6 billion and India roughly US$ 766 million. The cost for Brazil and Germany comes in at over US$ 200 million.
WHO urges countries and cities to follow the example of France, Spain, and cities like San Francisco, California in the USA, which have implemented 'extended producer responsibility legislation' making the tobacco industry responsible for clearing up the pollution it creates.
WHO also calls on policy-makers to treat cigarette filters as single-use plastics and consider banning them to protect public health and the environment.
