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Al-Ahram Weekly 25 February - 3 March 1999 Issue No. 418 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 25 February - 3 March 1999 Issue No. 418
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Shrouded in smoke
By Fatemah FaragThere is a latent paradox in the government's attitude to cigarette consumption. On the one hand, it has led the way in enacting strong anti-smoking legislation, but at the same time, the state continues to be a mega-producer of the offending items.
This Dr Jeckell and Mr Hyde approach came to mind while watching hundreds of high school students standing in neat lines in the cold morning air, listening to a school radio broadcast informing them of the ills of juvenile smoking. This is not a regular occurrence, of course, but part of a week-long national campaign organised by the government to discourage minors from picking up the habit.
"Excuse me -- do not sell cigarettes to our children", is the slogan under which the Ministry of Health, in coordination with 10 other ministries, launched the campaign. Dr Ismail Sallam, minister of health and population, underlined the gravity of the situation by citing a number of troubling statistics: today, there are 6 million Egyptian smokers consuming a total of 42 billion cigarettes annually, a figure which, it is estimated, will increase to 85 billion by the year 2000. Sallam also pointed to studies which claim that 439,000 of Egypt's present smokers are children below the age of 10.
These new figures complete the picture painted by previous surveys, which have shown a continuing rise in the number of Egyptian smokers, against a background of rising numbers across the developing countries, and falling numbers in the developed world. Take, for example, the 1995 USAID figures. These indicate that 55 per cent of Egyptian males are smokers and that throughout the 1980s, the number of smokers increased at a rate of 5 per cent per year. A 1995 World Health Organisation (WHO) report on tobacco economics in the eastern Mediterranean region said that the number of smokers in Egypt had increased by 274 per cent between 1963 and 1990.
"It is great to smoke and I would not stop," boasted Essam Fathi as he furtively flicked the ash from the tip of his cigarette, shrouded in the smoke spewed out by buses as they groaned past the crowds of people rushing round Tahrir Square. "It is one of the few pleasures I have. Otherwise, life is very mundane, and difficult, too." It is no surprise then that a 1989 WHO study, carried out in cooperation with the Central Authority for Public Mobilisation and Statistics, found that 5 per cent of family income is spent, in one form or another, on smoking.
Furthermore, the sight of children huffing and puffing on cigarettes has become commonplace. "I sell cigarettes to kids from my neighbourhood -- they buy farrt (by the cigarette, not by pack)," admits a kiosk owner in the working class district of Shubra. "I know it is not good, but these kids work and come to buy with their own money. How can I refuse them?"
The adverse effects of smoking are not to be taken lightly, especially when combined with the high levels of air pollution. WHO reports that smoking causes 90 per cent of cases of lung cancer in Egypt and that 14.8 per cent of male deaths in 1987 were smoking-related, compared to 8.9 per cent in 1974.
Faced with a growing problem, the government banned cigarette advertising on television in 1977, and has said that cigarette packs must carry health warnings and information on tar and nicotine content. As early as 1981, legislation was passed banning smoking on public transport. In the same year, Sheikh Mohamed Sayed Tantawi -- then Grand Mufti -- ruled that smoking is haram (sinful).
Despite these efforts, the tobacco industry is expected to expand and the public sector Eastern Tobacco Company is likely to be one of the main beneficiaries. The company, established in 1920 and nationalised in 1956, has a monopoly on local production and is the largest cigarette manufacturer in the Middle East. According to the latest statistics, it manufactures 0.7 per cent of the world's total output of cigarettes. In 1996, the company employed 17,000 people and had the capacity to produce 180 million cigarettes per day, though it was running at only 70 per cent capacity. The government also benefits from the sale of cigarettes through revenue from taxes and tariffs. Although an increase in cigarette prices in 1992 was used to fund student health programmes, 57 per cent of the cost of a packet of domestic cigarettes is tax, and imported cigarettes are subject to an 85 per cent customs tariff.
If international trends reported by WHO are good indicators, developing countries will be the major markets for cigarette producers in future years. In 1996, per capita consumption of cigarettes in developed countries dropped by an average of 1.4 per cent; in the developing countries, it increased by 1.7 per cent.
Given the underlying facts of cigarette production and consumption in Egypt, one may wonder how this week's campaign could possibly have any effect. "We think it is a very positive initiative," the regional WHO public relations office told Al-Ahram Weekly. "We issued a report last year entitled 'Growing Up Without Tobacco' and we feel that this is an encouraging response."
The Heliopolis high school students are getting ready to head to class. "Yes, I think smoking is very bad," says Mohamed as he trudges along, his heavy bag of books weighing down his shoulder. "It's for grown-ups only."
