A tax on not smoking?

The subject of agricultural subsidies is one of the key topics in discussion of international trade justice. While rich countries have, through the WTO, insisted that poor countries remove trade barriers such as tariffs on agricultural products and subsidies to their farmers, the European Union and the USA heavily subsidise their farmers. In the UK, a variety of campaign groups have worked hard to make their calls for reform of the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) heard. We are assured that the discussion of reform is now very much on the table.

The issues usually raised against the CAP boil down to the hypocrisy of requiring one standard of poor countries while we (who can afford to do otherwise) don’t apply it to ourselves, and to the fact that the way the subsidy payments are structured means that the majority of the money ends up going to a small number of wealthy landowners, rather than to the small farmers who most desperately need support. That’s setting aside the argument which the ‘free trade’ ideologues would put forward that such subsidies are a false economy, halting developments towards ’efficiency’.

In that context, I was quite taken aback to find this article discussing the start of talks on plans to phase out subsidies to farmers growing tobacco. Use of taxpayer money to subsidise the production of foods has at least some justifications, but the production of a narcotic is something else.

The article quotes Pierre Haein, director of France Tabac, saying:

“The disappearance of Europe’s tobacco industry will in no way resolve the issue of smoking and health. As long as smoking is legal in Europe, it’s obvious that cigarette manufacturers will get their tobacco supply from somewhere else in the world.”

He’s likely right that an end to the subsidies won’t suddenly bring an end to the nicotine addiction of millions of people, but that would seem to be besides the point. This discussion is not about outlawing tobacco production, but ceasing to use the money of taxpayers to reduce the prices of something governments across Europe are trying to discourage the use of.

While it is disgraceful that tobacco production is being subsidised in this way, it could be that this issue is a good one with which to raise awareness of the ludicrous structure of agricultural subsidies. The issues can be made simpler than trade negotiators tend to acknowledge, but they are necessarily complex and campaigners need ‘hooks’ with which to draw people into scrutinising the way subsidy systems are implemented.