An organisation representing tobacco growers today launched a protest against demands being made for imposing 'plain packaging' which involves removal of branding and promotional information from tobacco products, saying that such policies will help foreign tobacco.
Members of Federation of All India Farmer Associations (FAIFA) appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to consider roll-back of the 85 per cent graphic warning rule and withhold policy makers from "one-sided" policy consultation on devastating tobacco packaging policies citing that foreign- funded agencies are propagating plain packaging on tobacco products so that foreign tobacco can rule the Indian market.
Gadde Seshagiri Rao, Vice-President of FAIFA, said hostile packaging policies such as large unwarranted picture warnings and plain packaging will destroy the local tobacco industry, the majority of which is unorganised sector with no employment fall-back option for farmers, beedi rollers, workers and retailers.
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"Beedies are made in India and are unique to India and the beedi industry is the third largest employer after agriculture and construction. Consumers will have no choice but to resort to buying smuggled and foreign tobacco, as past data has firmly established that such measures have failed to reduce tobacco consumption in India," Rao said.
He further said, "Every available data and case study across the world point to only one conclusion - that hostile packaging policies are here to only help foreign tobacco at the cost of the livelihood of Indian farmers and workers in the large unorganised sector in India".
"We ask the government to create win-win tobacco policies, and not entertain one-sided interests. A holistic policy must provide for alternative livelihood options to farmers before making consumers switch to foreign tobacco which is what hostile packaging policies will accelerate," Rao said.
Ram Ashrey Mishra, President from Akhil Bharatiya Pan Vikreta Sangathan, said that tobacco packs with oversized 85 per cent graphic health warnings have been forced in the market against the wishes of the largest sections of the people of the country.
"Sadly, even before their impact has been understood, demands for plain packaging by foreign agencies and foreign funded NGO's have begun. What more proof does anyone need that there is a continued and consistent effort to bring in foreign tobacco to rule the Indian market. This is anti-national," Mishra said.
