China to Miss its Pledge to Ban Smoking at Public Indoor Venues

China's tobacco control authority says the country will likely miss the January 9th deadline on which it must fulfill a World Health Organization pledge to fully ban smoking inside public indoor venues, given that past tobacco control measures have been proved ineffective.

Wu Jia has more.

China has 350 million smokers, a number that almost equals to the population of the United States. The number of secondhand smokers is even more stunning at 740 million.

Five years ago, China joined the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in which it promised to implement a total smoking ban at indoor venues by 2011.

But Yang Gonghuan, Director of China's National Office of Tobacco Control, says the country will miss the deadline.
She says past and current tobacco control measures haven't worked well despite efforts made by both government and society.

"Opposition to tobacco control is very strong, and sometimes it is backed by government bodies. So those for or against tobacco control are struggling with each other fiercely."

Yang Gonghuan points out that tobacco control regulations should be overseen by the highest level of the government instead of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology which manages tobacco manufacturing.

The State Tobacco Monopoly Administration, a department under the ministry, controls the state-owned China National Tobacco Corporation.

Yang Gonghuan says past experience has shown that conflicts of interest have hampered tobacco control measures.

Zhou Yangmin, a tobacco control expert, agrees.

"The government itself is involved in tobacco manufacturing. I have long advocated that tobacco enterprises be stripped from the government. We can't expect the government to produce tobacco on the one hand and control it on the other."

Experts are also calling for the total ban on smoking at indoor venues to be included in China's legislative agenda.

This has prompted some legislatures at the local level to take the lead by enacting regulations that ban smoking in public places.

Last year, tobacco control regulations came into effect in Shanghai and Guangzhou, as both cities vowed to stage a smoke-free World Expo and Asian Games.

In Beijing, a temporary smoking ban was put in place in 2008 for a smoke-free Olympic Games. But more than two years after the Games, smoking in public places rebounded significantly.

Yang Gonghuan, the tobacco control official, says the situation is not optimistic.

"Given that the determination is not strong enough at the state level, the local regulations are far from effective to ban

smoking in all enclosed public places and workplaces. In fact, no local regulations could meet the demands of the Convention except a smoking ban announced by the Health Ministry."

The Health Ministry requires all health-related government agencies and facilities to become totally smoke-free this year.

For CRI, I'm Wu Jia.