Should the U.S Support U.S Company Interests Abroad

case 4-7: making socially responsible and ethical marketing decisions: selling tobacco to third world countries

Tobacco use is a growing global epidemic, hitting the third world, Eastern Europe, and the former Soviet Union the hardest.

Ten million people will die each year from tobacco-related diseases by 2030.

The U.S. government has long assisted the international expansion of U.S. tobacco multinationals through promotional trade policies and tolerance of double standards in industry behavior.

Negotiations on a global tobacco treaty could help rein in Big Tobacco's global expansion. The human costs of tobacco use are staggering and rising dramatically. Every eight seconds, someone in the world dies from tobacco use— 4 million deaths a year. If current trends continue, that number will soar to 10 million by 2030, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), with 70% of those deaths occurring in the third world. Given these figures, over 150 million people will die from tobacco-related diseases over the next 30 years—exceeding the toll from AIDS, automobile accidents, maternal mortality, homicide, and suicide combined.

Facing declining markets in developed countries, the U.S. tobacco industry has aggressively expanded overseas, particularly in recently opened markets in Asia, the former Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe, where the bulk of the world's smokers live.

Philip Morris now sells more cigarettes abroad