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Article

21 Nov 2017

Author:
Jane Buchanan, Human Rights Watch

Tobacco cos. commit to protecting child workers in their supply chains

"Tobacco companies commit to protect child workers worldwide", 15 November 2017

With a major change to an industry-wide due diligence program, the Sustainable Tobacco Program (STP), now at least 180 tobacco companies are pledging to prohibit all children under 18 from handling green tobacco on farms in their supply chains. The STP is used by major multinational manufacturers and leaf dealers as well as other tobacco companies operating in 52 countries, which combined are contracting with hundreds of thousands of farms worldwide... We have consistently found that many children who handle tobacco are at serious risk of nicotine poisoning, also known as Green Tobacco Sickness... While companies haven’t yet gone far enough in implementing this ban on children working with tobacco, the new requirements could protect millions of children from nicotine poisoning.