Drafting and adopting a policy without any prior information on the actual situation may not yield the best outcome. At best, the policy would not be as effective as desired. At worst, it may have no effect at all. The tobacco industry has been exposed for not disclosing information or providing misleading information on the various aspects of its business. For these reasons, governments must require the tobacco industry to be transparent about its operations and ensure that the information provided is accurate. Precise and adequate information helps to strengthen policies to counter tobacco industry interference.
What you will learn
- Why transparency of tobacco industry operations is needed
- What the important considerations are for designing a policy on tobacco industry transparency
- How a government can implement Article 5.3 Recommendation 5 in its national legislation as demonstrated by France
Materials used in this chapter
Reports and references in the discussion
- Guidelines for the implementation of Article 5.3 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control
- Public Health Code of France
- Decree for enforcing reporting of expenses related to activities of influence or representation of interest
- Webinar on “Enforcing Transparency by Requiring and Managing Information from the Tobacco Industry”