T

he controversial tobacco bill has again been challenged for its bias toward the tobacco industry and farmers.

Public health expert Hasbullah Thabrany criticized lawmakers’ obstinance to include health provisions in the bill, which is set to be passed this year.

Hasbullah, an expert with the University of Indonesia’s (UI) Center for Health Economics and Policy Studies, said regulations related to public health, including the tobacco bill, had to benefit not only a particular group of people but the public as a whole.

He was referring to the rationale used by the House of Representatives in promoting the bill, which is solely aimed at protecting tobacco growers.

“Regulations have to protect all citizens. The House has to ensure that it provides protection to other stakeholders, such as smokers and passive smokers,” Hasbullah told The Jakarta Post in a telephone
interview.

Hasbullah also said tobacco growers should be protected by a lower regulation, such as a presidential regulation.

“Lawmakers have to create regulations that protect rice farmers, whose numbers are greater than tobacco farmers in the country,” he said. The tobacco legislation has drawn criticism from the public for protecting the industry at the cost of public health.

Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) legal aid coordinator Julius Ibrani said the bill, a priority in the 2016 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas), had neglected health considerations because it aimed to support a 2015 industry ministerial decree that advocated doubling cigarette production from the 260 billion cigarettes stipulated in a previous decree, to 524.2 billion in 2020.

In a recent interview with the Post, lawmaker Teuku Taufiqulhadi of the United Development Party (PPP) said the bill would be “a panacea for tobacco growers caught in the toils of the tobacco trading
system”.

He cited the provision regarding partnership between tobacco farmers and the industry as a way to “shorten the tobacco trading chain”.

According to a copy of the draft bill obtained by the Post, article 16 stipulates that the partnership is aimed at increasing additional value for tobacco growers, the industry and citizens from the outset of the tobacco production until the post-production.

“With the partnership mechanism, farmers will not be in the weakest position in the chain, as they could directly sell the tobacco to the industry. Currently, there are lots of parties in the trading system, ranging from traders, middlemen and graders to cigarette producers,” Taufiqulhadi said.

The bill will not focus on the health aspect, Taufiqulhadi said.

“That is the domain of the Health Ministry,” the lawmaker said, referring to the absence of an obligation for cigarette producers to create pictorial health warnings in the bill.

Article 35 of the bill stipulates cigarette producers must include on their labels explanations of tar and nicotine content, health risks and a warning for selling or giving cigarettes to children and pregnant women, but does not require pictorial health warnings, as stipulate in several prevailing regulations.

Several regulations require cigarette makers to include pictorial health warnings, including the 2009 Health Law and a 2012 governmental regulation on the control of tobacco products as an addictive substance.

Article 199 of the 2009 Health Law also stipulates that cigarette makers disobeying this obligation could face a maximum sentence of five years behind bars and a fine of Rp 500 million.

The absence of the pictorial health warning rule has driven antitobacco activists to purport “foul play” in the deliberation of the bill, with several sessions held behind closed doors, including a session at Sultan Hotel in Jakarta on June 25. (mos)